Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 220

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is there a list of privileges and duties that admins have

I just found out (I think?) that admins can introduce, either intentionally or unintentionally, malicious code to Wikipedia.

So is there a list somewhere where we can all check what admins can or cannot do here? Ottawahitech (talk) 15:09, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Privileges? Yeah, right... There's a full list of what admins can do at
Wikipedia:Administrators/Tools. Yunshui 雲‍水
15:20, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
A more technical list (for all user rights) is at Special:ListGroupRights. Legoktm (talk) 15:25, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Admins don't write the MediaWiki code, if that's what you're talking about. Anyone can write template code, which is merely markup. KillerChihuahua?!? 15:26, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
If you are talking about permissions granted to admins here they are: Wikipedia:User_access_levels#Table, but not privileges. --SMS Talk 15:28, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
If any admin were to introduce malicious code on your .css page, then they wouldn't be an admin for much longer. GiantSnowman 15:33, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

The problem

There's a lot that people have claimed is the problem with RfA.

I think that a lot of the issues at RfA would be dealt with if RfA had an "undo" process, just like editing has an undo option.

Whether it's true or not, the perception by the community that adminship is for life, and the perception that the community itself is "powerless" to address trust issues concerning admins, is likely the biggest problem with RfA. It's creating an environment of 'fear".

And this is going to remain a problem unless/until both: a.) people feel comfortable that the community can remove community-entrusted adminship and b.) such removal process prevents pitchforking, lynch mobs, and so forth (which could prevent admins from wanting to resolve policy-based things which a limited group may potentially disagree with).

Removal of adminship has been a process that's long been requested, but, as we have seen in the past, it's tough to balance those two criteria.

The

WP:RRA
process is still under design (not ready for prime time, I think). But I would welcome help with it, even if it's just expressed thoughts. (Even if those thoughts disagree : )

I think I want to go live with this proposal in the near future. - jc37 02:59, 5 November 2012 (UTC)

A process on its deathbed

The number of active editors (defined as having made 100 or more edits in a month) on the English Wikipedia versus the number of successful adminship candidacies, 2002-2012.

I just produced this - as you can see, the proportion of successful admin candidacies per active editor has dropped dramatically, while the number of active editors has only gradually decreased from its peak of five years ago. I chose successful candidacies rather than all candidacies, because there are various reasons why a candidacy can fail that have nothing to do with the process.

I define an "active editor" as an editor that's made 100 or more edits in a month, a level which, conveniently, is recorded in the stats. Anyone editing less than this isn't realistically in the pool of potential administrator candidates.

If you ask me, these numbers show RfA is due a reading of the last rites. —

(❝?!❞)
15:44, 6 November 2012 (UTC)

I don't fully understand the graph. What does "equivalent candidacies per 1k editors" mean and why is it important? Why is the y-axis a logarithmic plot? ‑Scottywong| confess _ 16:43, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Ok, I think I get it after staring at it for awhile. The yellow line is candidacies/(1000*activeEditors), and it's important because it shows that the number of RfA candidates is declining at a faster rate than the number of active editors is declining. Still don't understand why it's a logarithmic plot though. ‑Scottywong| prattle _ 16:45, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
  • It's just because the chart begins with a huge spike that makes the later variations so small as to be unreadable; this way I was able to keep in all the data. The scaling of the number of candidacies to be per 1000 active editors was again for readability's sake. I've removed the word "equivalent" - it's a long time since I did any maths or stats (high school?) so I may well have phrased it badly! —
    (❝?!❞)
    19:36, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
The declining no. of editors doesn't look problematic. Most of the historic and general articles are covered and hence as time goes, the edits required to Wikipedia are only those for recording current events. The number of admins may be reducing, but I have a feeling that the productivity and effectiveness of an admin is increasing. --Anbu121 (talk me) 16:59, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
If this is indeed the case, it is very bad since it leads to a burnout.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:03, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
The success of RfA should not be judged by how many candidates but by how many administrators there are per 1,000 editors. RfA is not an end in itself; it is the product which counts. Binksternet (talk) 17:23, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
How many Admins does it require to service (a) current and (b) future anticipated demand? That would be informative. Leaky Caldron 17:04, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Something like a graph of total no. of admin actions and total number of active admins? --Anbu121 (talk me) 17:30, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
If you really want a stat, here's one: we have passed a lowly 21 administrators in 2012, which is less than half of our worst year which was 2011 (52 passed). According to Wikipedia:Former administrators, there have been a total of (as of this writing) 93 desysoppings for various reasons and another 18 that are pending for the rest of the year. So, barring no nominations through November and December and the above holding true, there will be 111 desysoppings and 21 promotions in 2012, a net loss of 90 administrators. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 17:40, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Assuming that 80+ of the desysops are voluntary relinguishment then the problem is Admin retention, not getting new Admins. Leaky Caldron 17:45, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
About 80% of the desysops that occurred (a little higher percentage if you include the pending) are inactive desysoppings. It's really both working in tandem. Administrators are losing interest in editing Wikipedia and RFA does not produce enough admnistrators to replace the amount that leave. At this point, for every one administrator we promote, we lose roughly 5. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 17:51, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
You're comparing apples and oranges. Remember that the definition of "inactive administrator" is no edits for 12 months, so we're not "losing" them in any real sense (at least, not at the point the tools are removed). What we should be measuring is the number of admin actions being performed and the number of admins performing them. Anecdotal evidence suggests it would reveal a large burden falling on far fewer shoulders than the number of admins would superficially suggest. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:03, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
As a sidenote, its the same 100 or so administrators doing the admin related actions. All the rest of the admins, with the exceptional occassional admin action, don't really use the tools. So what we really should do, is to make some kind of rule that if they don't do at least 1 action a month (a pretty low number frankly) then after 90 days of doing no admin actions the tools are revoked. Its nothing personal but this will cut down on some of the hat collecting. Of course I say all that knowing that it will never get anything close to a consensus and in fact will probably be ridiculed by the usual suspects who shoot holes in every suggestion, but its just a thought. 108.28.162.125 (talk) 02:26, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
There is logic in the suggestion, but those admins who make only occasional admin actions are actually quite valuable—there are enough of them that the work for the most active 100 would significantly increase if we lost them all. There are also admins who are inactive or barely active for weeks for months at a time for whatever reason (we're all volunteers) but may be much more active at other times. But anyway, my point was that the number of people with the bit is not the same thin as "active admins" (measured by admin actions). HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:36, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
I think my point to bringing the stat up, was that RFA is highly ineffective, and in that sense, the two stats are completely correlated. "Activity", pending whatever your definition, is not the matter of me bringing it up (inactive administrators were considered active at one point too anyways.) So yes, 110+ desysoppings and 20+ successful RFA promotions in a years time is in fact a problem. Considering most of the desysoppings are for inactivity, this also means they are no longer a contributor to Wikipedia, so I'm not sure how you can say we are not really missing them. So again, this cycle of low promotions (with a high rate of administrators leaving and going inactive) is eventually going to hurt us if we can't replace more admins than we lose. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 02:21, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
Obviously outgoing admins (those who are desysopped for inactivity) are inactive, but there are a bunch of admins who are already inactive but are still counted as active. They will be counted as inactive next year.--Ymblanter (talk) 06:58, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
Terrible suggestion. Some of our admins use the tools, responsibly, on an infrequent basis - so stop them from doing even that. Why yes, that'll fix many of our problems. —
(❝?!❞)
20:18, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

RFC: RFA - one question

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
After a week, there's little support and no more comments are being made on the suggestion, so it's safe to hat this as no consensus for this change. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 19:42, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Should we update the RFA guidelines for contributing editors to allow only a single question for the nominated editor. This will not effect how many times an editor can discuss on the RFA or any further limitation. Multi part questions will remain at the discretion of the community as usual. Currently, the

talk
) 05:53, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

  • No, that's just getting into too much
    creep. If an editor is obviously adding an excessive amount of questions that aren't relative, just hat them or remove them. Legoktm (talk
    ) 06:05, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
  • Is there a a big problem with too many questions? I don't look at every RfA but most seem to have a reasonable number of questions without too much duplication between those questions. Per Kudpung, duplicates, trivial questions, etc., can always be ignored or answered as "per Question X above".
    TalkQu
    08:18, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
There used to be some concerns that some questions were not really fair - it was in fact an issue that I raised after doing some research into it. However, it appears to have stabilised somewhat although not entirely, but the number of RfAs has now dropped to such a low that it's not easy to apply any metrics. As I said above, candidates are free to refuse to answer. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 09:45, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
  • No I don't think it's necessary, it doesn't allow follow up questions, and it doesn't allow for people who ask multiple good questions (which is mostly the case).
    talk
    ) 11:27, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
  • I think that the best solution is for candidates to stop answering these "optional" questions. Eventually the nuisance questioners like jc37 would get the message. Sure, some editor would oppose on the basis that questions weren't answered. Some candidates would fail because of this. That doesn't bother me at all. Axl ¤ [Talk] 17:58, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
  • With appreciation for efforts to improve RFA and remembering that I ran for RFA over four years ago, I don't think this aspect of questioning is problematic enough to require a change of this nature. MBisanz talk 18:14, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
  • We're not children (well, most of us aren't), we can decide for ourselves how many questions is appropriate. If an editor consistently asks a disruptive quantity of questions, then we need to deal with that editor individually. ‑Scottywong| chat _ 18:30, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
  • If we are to keep as many questions as needed for each participant then perhaps the candidates should stop complaining about the amount of questions. If not, expect a little a bite back when they do. I like asking questions. If the candidate doesn't like it than they should shut up and answer them. Period. If they don't wish to, than let the community judge them and those asking the questions. This works. But candidates need to stop whining when they refuse to answer and suddenly another question appears to get them to give up the info.--
    talk
    ) 00:26, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
    • All the questions are optional. Some take more time for the candidate to answer than others. Some are pretty easy like "What accounts have you used in the past?" Others are much more complicated like "What would you do if X happened?". I also don't think it's a good idea to change the entire RfA process based on the actions of one or two candidates. If it becomes a repeating problem, then it's worth looking into. Legoktm (talk) 00:47, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
    • I don't remember seeing any candidates complaining or whining about the number of questions. Axl ¤ [Talk] 09:15, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
  • I'd go further. I continue to believe "optional questions" shouldn't be allowed (even though I post them sometimes), nor should nomination statements other than self-noms. Candidates should be granted adminship based on their own requests and their records as they exist at the time of RFA, not their ability to answer question 17(f) about the difference between a block and a ban. There is a Talk page available for discussing issues with the candidate if there's anything that merits discussion. Of course, I realize I'm in the minority and the loose consensus is for continuing to run RFA as a quiz show. But I know I'd be a better voter without the optional questions, which are mostly designed to trip candidates up and distract from the more relevant issue of trustworthiness.
    Townlake (talk
    ) 01:20, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
I understand your views (and as a recent candidate, I wouldn't hate to see the questions part go away), but I don't see the harm in other users serving as nominators. That demonstrates that the candidate has earned the trust of other members. Besides, some people dislike self-noms simply on principle.
AutomaticStrikeout
01:25, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
If self-noms were required, your last issue would become irrelevant since candidates could only emerge through self-nom, and the community wants candidates. The folks who vote against all self-noms as a sign of "power hunger" are a microscopic minority anyway. As for "earned the trust of other members," if a candidate is trusted, people have ample opportunity to demonstrate their support for them below the candidate's self-nom, in the "Support" section.
Townlake (talk
) 02:11, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
Well, you are entitled to your opinion. However, I don't see why requiring self noms would be a benefit to the project.
AutomaticStrikeout
02:19, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
It would probably be unwise to introduce any restrictions that would discourage editors from participating at RfA. Clearly some questions are posed by newbies and/or editors who simply think it's cool to post on such a high-level debate, while some questions are occasionally fishing for answers to things the posers do not know themselves. In my opinion (not shared by all) some questions are patently silly. I also believe that the type of questions that send the candidate on time consuming multiple errands are not constructive.
If the RfA system were to rely on self-noms alone, there would be even fewer candidates. I don't see any compelling reasons to change this either.
The main issue with RfA is, and always has been, the level of civility in the votes and comments by the voters, the quality of the votes, and the experience of the voters. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:35, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
The community roundly ignored your RFA Reform 2011 project. I'm not too concerned about your skepticism.
Townlake (talk
) 03:08, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
The community is likely to roundly ignore anything in the way of change to RfA at this point. I wish I was wrong, but it seems every proposition will get shot down.
AutomaticStrikeout
03:10, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
@Townlake. Let's get the facts straight please: the community did not roundly ignore 'my' project. It was a huge project contributed to by many, including some whose personal participation was not constructive and in some cases, not civil. What the project did not do was to propose any reform at RfC that the community could roundly ignore.
There are plenty of mature editors who don't hesitate to make disingenuous remarks and disparage the good faith of editors and admins who at least try to improve things. Those who were prepared to stick their necks out to improve the climate here were not consequent enough because they were simply fed up with the negative comments about their work, so at the end of the day, why should they bother? Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:14, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
You remain stuck in a rejected thought paradigm. Oppose statements have to be firmly negative in order to receive appropriate weight from the closing 'crats; soft opposes sound wishy-washy and can receive less weight in discretionary cases. "Negative comments" about another person will often be taken the wrong way, of course. But unless you're ready to eliminate comments and make RFA a straight vote -- which is what I've wanted to do here for a long time -- all you're advocating is a muzzle on Oppose votes, which thankfully is a concept the broader community has repeatedly rejected. (e.g., see the recently-closed RFC above.)
Townlake (talk
) 12:53, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
You are deliberately misreading me and making pure conjecture just as your colleague Malleus has been doing for years. The issue is about civility. Learn some yourself. A rather large proportion of your 2,921 edits to Wikipedia have been on or about RfA - what is your agenda? Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:36, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
Your comparison of Malleus to me is desperate. Malleus goes on obscenity-laced tirades and is regularly brought up at the dramaboards. I fit neither category, and I'd ask you for an apology if you were a contributor I respected. Anyway, the rest of your post just seeks to marginalize my ideas by mocking my edit count, which is regrettable, but not surprising given what I've seen from you in the past.
Townlake (talk
) 20:06, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
I deny this as absolutely false, and while not uncivil, is a conjecture that is a de facto personal attack. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:47, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
So I agree with Malleus about something. I probably agreed with you about something once too. At any rate, this has become completely nonconstructive and is distracting from the RFC, so I'm going to walk away.
Townlake (talk
) 02:18, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
How about making the first mandatory question

What administrative work do you intend to take part in? In answering please explain why you wish to take part in it, your understanding of what the work entails and why you believe you are qualified to do so.

That would probably eliminate the need for at least half the optional questions, or at least make them much more focused on the specifics.
TalkQu
06:54, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
That would be the next route. To have a discussion on adding to, or changing the RFA questions.--
talk
) 20:35, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
What is top on your list?--
talk
) 20:35, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
I don't know about the top, but I'll list two things further up the list. I think it is horribly inefficient to, effectively, ask every contributor to review every aspect of every candidate. I'd like to see more organization, where editors sign up to review, for example, blocks of edits, or all CSD nominations, or all talk page interactions, then provide a summary of their findings. This would work especially well in a two-phase approach, where we spend a few days investigating, then a few days voting. Second, I'd like to see support for User:Sphilbrick/Tour of Duty, which is intended to address a number of issues, but one of them is to help identify whether RfA candidates are suitable.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 16:14, 28 October 2012 (UTC)
  • I was happy to get a lot of questions. I had a lot of 'splainin to do. I would rather people ask me about something that I've said or something that happened than for them to just assume and vote. No questions would only work for the carefully groomed accounts with exactly 1000 edits a month for the last 8 months, 2FAs + vandal fighting, without ever touching anything controversial, which seems to be the current magic formula. Gigs (talk) 07:34, 28 October 2012 (UTC)
    • You sure about that? Theopolisme Boo! 00:22, 29 October 2012 (UTC)
      • What do you mean? He passed RfA with flying colors. My comment wasn't directed at him specifically if that's what you are saying, but yes, that's a good example of the type of user I'm talking about. Gigs (talk) 07:21, 29 October 2012 (UTC)
  • Sigh. This is one of those tiresome "let's propose something I don't want to happen in order to make a point" proposals. Amadscientist did not have to start an RfC to say this, which is the only reason we're here. As others have said, the questions section hardly bears mentioning in a list of RfA's problems. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 14:46, 29 October 2012 (UTC)
    • That is pretty pointy. I'd support closing it based on that. Gigs (talk) 16:54, 29 October 2012 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Perhaps the comment was pointy, but many comments on this RFC and this page are. The accusation from Chris Cunningham that the RFC was made just so I could make that point and didn't want it to happen was innaccurate. I did feel the RFA where editors seemed to stick to a single question worked very well. That is why I made the proposal. Nothing more.--

talk
) 19:35, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

I was thinking...

I just thought I would post my thoughts here, not sure they would go anywhere else.
I was thinking yesterday... If one takes a look at the total number of successful RfAs per the total number of participant-editors in different eras, what does the over-all picture look like? When the project was newer, more people were willing to run and more RfAs were successful and the perspective was different. You have fewer/newer/less-entrenched gatekeepers dealing with comparatively bigger numbers of RfA applications so the scrutiny, the scrutiny wasn't as excruciating, wasn't as sharply-focussed, it was few -> many. Now if we turn to the recent state of RfAs, we have a more-entrenched editorship, higher in numbers(maybe?) but dealing with fewer RfAs, so there are more gatekeepers sifting through fewer applicants, and now it is many -> few. If, for instance, tomorrow all of a sudden, 10 or 20 people applied with decent credentials, there is no way that those RfAs would be as painful as they are presently rumored to be. All us gatekeepers just wouldn't be able to spend the time it would require to do the type of nitpicking/painstaking carefulness/gauntlet-making that RfA now is. No proposals, just thinking about perspectives. Shearonink (talk) 01:23, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

Hmmm. Well, when I did my RFA, most of the people took an hour or two to look through my entire edit history. So that part hasn't changed. But perhaps they were looking for different things? More along the lines of whether one was/could be a good, clueful member of the community, or something to that effect. <scratches head> --Kim Bruning (talk) 06:15, 7 November 2012 (UTC) ceterum censeo: everyone who shows aptitude should be able to become an admin. More of a drivers license than a "run the community" kind of thing.
Ceterum censeo, Petitio Magistratus delenda est. —
(❝?!❞)
12:59, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
The scrutiny is the problem. To briefly sum up an essay that I'm thinking of writing, people have forgotten what a learning process is, and expect complete knowledge in advance; and have developed a complete lack of tolerance as a result. It's like all sense of perspective has gone out of the window. People make mistakes, so what? Fix the error, talk to them about it so they can learn what to do, and move on. But no, Wikipedia has somehow become this all-consuming thing where anything but perfection on the part of a potential administrator is a complete disaster for the world. Where has our sense of humility gone? When did we forget wabi-sabi?
I'm never going to give up on this project, but I can tell you that since it began, what it's gained in size it's lost in philosophy; and that makes me sad. —
(❝?!❞)
09:34, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Is
WP:SHUARI any help? --Kim Bruning (talk
) 23:13, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, that cheers me up a little. WardsWiki is where I got started with all this, way back before Wikipedia existed. It's nice to see that here. —
(❝?!❞)
14:01, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
WP:SHUARI has the makings of being useful but needs some polishing up. See talk. Ironically, one of the major contributors is a blocked sock... Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk
) 23:37, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

I've been inactive for several years. Looking at

polarscribe (talk
) 12:16, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

I know, right? I wonder when it changed. It couldn't be much later than yours; by late 2006 when I tried the first time it had already started resembling what it is now. In fact, it was
(❝?!❞)
14:23, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
(ec) I agree with others here. I have seen qualified applicant after qualified applicant shot down over one small incident in their past - and I don't mean a block or something, but an article that somebody thinks contains close paraphrasing, or a time when they lost their temper. Somehow we have gotten into the philosophy that it isn't enough for an admin applicant to be good - they have to be PERFECT. Isn't there some way to make this process more civil - and more relevant? --MelanieN (talk) 14:29, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
More relevant to what? Leaky Caldron 15:07, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
More relevant to what administrators actually do - and to the basic admin requirements: trustworthy, even-tempered, reliably active, and familiar with most aspects of the pedia (although I think there is a case to be made for admins who don't know or care anything about one particular area, as long as it is clear they will stick to what they know). --MelanieN (talk) 16:00, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
Kinda along the lines
BWilkins←✎
) 16:09, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
It seems that everyone today is looking for the slightest, tiniest reason that someone shouldn't be an admin, rather than asking whether or not a person will misuse the tools. That really should be the only criteria: "Is this person likely to misuse the tools?" If they are, they shouldn't have them, clearly. But nitpicking the split of content contributions down to calculating percentages or the number of all-caps edit summaries seems to be entirely, entirely missing the point of the admin bit. This place really has changed, and, well, the chart with the number of new admins over time pretty much tells the story.
polarscribe (talk
) 17:46, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
BWilkins←✎
) 18:23, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
Not really ironic. Administrators have always been held to a higher standard, but a higher standard is not a standard of total perfection. This is a project involving group interaction, battles of ideas and inevitable conflict. If the community expectation is that an administrator who makes a mistake is immediately unworthy of the bit, and that no person who has ever made a mistake in the past is worthy of getting the bit... well, here we are, wondering why nobody is even applying to be an administrator.
polarscribe (talk
) 18:34, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
Mistakes are not the issue. Hence people can be successful on a second RFA if they have shown the willingness/desire to improve (it took me two tries). It's those people who remain steadfast that they're right and have zero need/desire to improve or change that are the issue. That shows an attitude that is unwelcome. We pretty much told you that, and where your own issues currently are when you re-requested your admin bit back unethically, and you proved us all right! (
BWilkins←✎
) 18:41, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
The number of successful RfAs in the past year and the number of RfAs that failed because of ridiculous nitpicking belies your statement that "mistakes are not the issue." The fact that it took you "two tries" is a bug, not a feature.
polarscribe (talk
) 18:45, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
I disagree. It took me two tries as well, and I think I'm all the better for it. For many candidates, the first try is a wake-up call, and an efficient way to communicate exactly what is expected in an admin, and what they are lacking to that end. Assuming they take the initial rejection well, and strive to improve, the second RfA generally passes easily. Like Bwilkins says, a candidate that believes they're always right, or who is unwilling to make changes to their behavior, is probably someone who wouldn't make a good admin. That's not to say that they wouldn't make a good Wikipedian, or that they couldn't participate at a high level in shaping the course of the project, but a certain measure of compliance and maturity is required to be trusted with sensitive tools. We need all types in the project; those who aren't interested in complying with rules might not make good admins, but they might have great ideas for how the rules could be changed, while the rest of us are just blindly following the rules instead of questioning them. ‑Scottywong| babble _ 19:20, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
And we're back to where we started - the process as it stands is so difficult, time-consuming, convoluted and drama-filled that vanishingly-few editors are even trying once, let alone bothering with a second try. If you think that's good and/or sustainable, I disagree.
polarscribe (talk
) 19:27, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
I never said that I thought RfA is currently good or sustainable. I believe that RfA generally passes good candidates and rejects bad ones, but RfA needs major improvement in order to encourage good candidates to come forward and run. There have probably been gigabytes of discussion over the last 2 years on how to modify RfA (see
WT:RFA2011 for a good chunk of it), and it seems like we're approaching a critical mass where there will be soon be sufficient support for change. Hopefully we make the right changes. ‑Scottywong| gab _
19:45, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
I have to agree with many of the comments about this issue, to wit: the RfA process neeeds to be liberalized. Bearian (talk) 20:26, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

It looks like the Process itself works like it's supposed to, but the people participating in the process are ... well, not using it like they're supposed to. <scratches head> There were something like 3 or 4 people who made statements that aren't even rational. A couple of people were calling up mistakes made over a year ago. And a set of single polite responses to comments is immediately branded as 'badgering'. I even tried stepping in on one of these personal attacks '!votes' , and wouldn't you know it, first thing that happens is a recent Arbcom case whacks me in the back of the head. Holy razzle frazzle you didn't think I'd actually swear, did you? :-P ding dong bell with a cherry on top! --Kim Bruning (talk) 01:53, 9 November 2012 (UTC) Maybe I should start taking language lessons from User:Ironholds? He knows so many useful --turns of phrase-- I'd like to try. O:-)

for the record, the above refers to Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Northamerica1000 --Kim Bruning (talk) 15:29, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
The voters, with the exception of a small core of regulars who generally understand the proess, is a transient pool of editors. The voting pattern on many RfAs generally shows a sturm of supports at the beginning, while the serious voters are still spending several hours doing their investigations. There's a well researched table on this at
WP:RFA2011 (it may even have been Scottywong. who made it). One of the reasons why RfA has gotten worse over the years is possibly that some one-off (or two-off) voters come in and tend to ape the kind of comments of others who have tended to turn it over time into a dramafest. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk
) 8:36 pm, Today (UTC+7)
Where is this table? Axl ¤ [Talk] 00:22, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
polarscribe (talk
) 07:17, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
I couldn’t locate a table that correlated an editor’s understanding with the timing of their vote during the process, but I believe he’s actually referring to the following pages where SW collated data on voter accuracy, participation, and experience:
profiles; analysis; voters. Mephistophelian (contact)
10:58, 10 November 2012 (UTC).
None of those tables support Kudpung's statement. Axl ¤ [Talk] 11:54, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

RFC: RFA inactivity

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
No consensus achived after a couple weeks, thanks to all those that participated. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 23:26, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

Let me preface this proposal with that it has nothing to do with RFA's process, bad faith voting, general lack of RFA candidates or anything of that sort, but rather just the activity of this page in general. Short and sweet proposal: That future requests for administrator and bureaucrat move from transcluding at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship, which has no activity and a lot of people watching, to Wikipedia:Requests for permissions which has activity and a smaller number of watchers. Extended rationale: I thought about this long and hard today and I was wondering exactly why RFA (and RFB) had it's own page anymore, and I couldn't come up with a real good reason as to why that is. When requests for adminship started so many years ago, most (if not all) of the permissions listed at

WP:PERM
did not exist and this page became the central hub for requesting any tools. However, with the decline of candidates (especially for bureaucrat, and now even seen on the administrator front), this process is relatively static. In the last two months, we have had decreasingly less users who have applied for adminship (and only one that passed) and users have been jokingly saying that we should tag this page as historical. On the other side, WP:PERM has backlog activity a lot of the time, and it is largely unwatched by the community except for the few administrators who go over to grant permissions. So, there are several hundred users watching this page do nothing and a small number of users watching the other permission granting. In addition to that, it gives the impression this permission is much more a big deal than the other permissions that it has its own page, and adminship is no big deal, right? So, the change I'm suggesting is actually very simple:

Seems like this would be fairly simple change that would benefit the project by centralizing permission granting, getting more eyes on a singular page and de-emphasizing RFA's importance without changing anything. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 20:58, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Support

  • Support. RFA and RFB are just requests for sets buttons, just like the other permissions. Anything that brings it back to that rather than the bizarre political hubbub it's morphed into over the years is a step in the right direction. --SB_Johnny | talk✌ 23:07, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
With all due respect, changing the title of the page where RfA's are discussed won't change the environment/attitude at RfA. ‑Scottywong| talk _ 23:11, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Support. I sincerely doubt it will help the RFA/RFB issues we currently face as a community, but it seems worth a try. No reason we couldn't move back if this doesn't help. --Nouniquenames 03:57, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Support - This really does make sense to me, a thinking-outside-the-box way of actually improving things, and whether or not it passes I really want to say Kudos to Moe, for coming up with something different. I've been investigating RfA for years now, I've read essays, I've gathered statistics, I've found out all sorts of information. When it came down to it, RfA does what it was intended to do - let's good candidates through and keeps out poor ones. However, one thing that it doesn't do is encourage editors to run. It has a massive PR problem, constantly being referred to as a "week of hell", a "gauntlet" or a place where attacks can be made without repercussions.

    This idea rebrands the process without losing the good bits. It distances itself from the problems of the past. Even if we don't do this now, I think we should do something like this as part of a larger reform - perhaps adding clerks or changing the process to be a two-part one, but the symbollic closure of RfA - ending an era - will be very powerful. WormTT(talk) 08:51, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

Recent events at Arbcom (I didn't comment there, and I'm not commenting on the outcome) may have a calming effect on some kinds of participation at RfA. I think a chance should be given to see if that is indeed the effect. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 09:14, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
Calming effect or chilling effect? I suspect the latter. WormTT(talk) 09:17, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
What recent events are you referring to? Sorry that I don't get the reference but I haven't been following arbitration cases closely. Snowolf How can I help? 12:04, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
Considering several active admins have gone on strike because of it, it might even make the headlines in Signpost. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 06:33, 3 November 2012 (UTC)
Pretty unhelpful response. Snowolf: you can read the whole thing here. Jenks24 (talk) 06:43, 3 November 2012 (UTC)
Thanks a lot! Snowolf How can I help? 12:36, 3 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Support for the reasons above; why not give it a try? Also, several other WMF wikis work this way. --Rschen7754 08:53, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Support - the fewer pages I have to watch to keep an eye on things the better. The activity is such that bundling in to a more high-traffic venue is a good idea. There is nothing to lose. Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:41, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Support can't be any worse than the current process. Wizardman 03:21, 4 November 2012 (UTC)

Oppose

  • Oppose as generally ridiculous. Why would moving RfA's to a shared venue make any sense? Typical requests for permissions are uncomplicated, and typically consist of a request and a single response. Typical RfA's routinely exceed 500Kb of discussion. On what universe would it make sense to merge these two processes onto one page, apparently for the implied purpose driving more admin traffic to
    WP:PERM in the hopes of clearing the backlog there (of which there is virtually none at the moment)? Sorry if I'm being rude, but this is a misguided proposal. ‑Scottywong| soliloquize _
    22:27, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Not too long ago there were 3 or 4 concurrent RfA's, none of which were speedily closed. Transcluding those RfA's to
WP:ANI and someone will come around to fix it. And, if you haven't noticed, there is always extensive ongoing discussion on this talk page about reforming RfA, that is nothing new. Artificially driving traffic by moving pages around is not the way to fix backlogs. ‑Scottywong| talk _
23:14, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
To address you in order:
There was three concurrent last month; PumpkinSky's ran 2 days while the other two ran full length. Again, it's not going to make the page any harder to read than WP:RFA already is. PERM is never particularly large in size of KB to begin with, so an RFA would be most of the KB on any page, whether it was transcluded here or there.
The point was, there is a lot of users here, who most of the time are not doing anything but discussing hopeless reform on a page that has no activity. So, if there is going to be these hopeless discussions, I'd rather have one centralized place, and a place like WP:PERM at least has activity and things for administrators to do a majority of the time.
This proposal isn't about shifting traffic to PERM (this is simply the best target), its to move it away from RFA. RFA is dead, statistically at least. September saw one (unsuccessful) candidacy, and a whole bunch of talk page discussion that resulted in squat. Essentially, this page is historical. Not because the process is broken or the general attitude of RFA, but because no one comes here anymore to ask for the permission to be an administrator anymore like they used to (far more head to PERM for a lesser tool).
This will be my final reply to you Scotty, since you seem particularly impassioned about RFA being just a permission, or whatever your reasoning is for being so pointed in your language. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 23:46, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
So, the purpose of this proposed change is to increase the number of editors who request admin permissions? How would changing the venue do that? It's not as if people don't know where to go to request adminship. If that's not the purpose of the proposed changes, then perhaps you should make the purpose more clear. Exactly what do you envision will change as a result of this proposal being enacted? ‑Scottywong| verbalize _ 23:58, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I'll answer this and I'll leave it to you to agree or disagree, and I'll try not to comment much more on this.
RFA was created back in 2002 in the hope that it would be what RFPERM is today, a few trusted users supporting or bringing up reasons that it might be time to wait on getting tools. Without a governor though, RFA spiraled into a political campaign for the admin candidate (the fact we call them candidates is abhorrent in of itself) with loaded questions, opponents drudging up every past indiscretion, users trying to get to
WP:200 by collecting supporters on other forums, and general incivility aplenty. RFPERM isn't like that because we don't allow the crap that made RFA what it is to be like that. RFA (and RFB which was collected in to the problem) in its current state is not a request for permission anymore, it's a certified Request For Adminship®, a completely separate Wikipedia process which is alienated from all other permission groups. RFA is a request for political status, not for tools. Absolutely, my intent is to make adminship an obtainable goal by more editors. We know where to request adminship, but no one wants to stick their neck out in fear of coming out beheaded. My intent is to stop the rabble-rousing on this page in the hopes that RFA will cease to exist, personally, because RFA is going to be poison as long as it's here. Once RFA is not a RFA anymore, and it's a request for permission, my hope is that it will be a culture shift, if anything. Will moving it be an immediate answer to a long-standing problem? Of course not, and no reform would be an immediate solution to fixing this problem. My hope is that we move past what it has become, by letting it morph back into it being about users getting tools to help maintain Wikipedia (something this page hasn't been in a long time). I sincerely hope this answers your questions about my intent. I know, wishful thinking and whatnot, but consolidating this page into a more active process and abandoning a long-standing toxic environment is the best way to go, I think. Regards, — Moe Epsilon
01:02, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
I applaud your initiative to make changes to a place that desperately needs change. I just disagree that simply changing the title of the page where RfA's take place will make a measurable difference in the political, rabble-rousing environment, nor will it encourage qualified candidates to come forward. If we want to change RfA, then we need to actually change RfA, not just the title of the page. If this proposal were in conjunction with substantive changes, like clerking or limiting threaded discussion, I would consider it more seriously. ‑Scottywong| confer _ 14:20, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose The other permissions are ones that admins set and unset according to whether candidates meet an agreed criteria, so transcluding RFA onto an otherwise admin focussed page could be seen as skewing the process towards admins. In practice we'd lose a whole bunch of occasional participants who have RFA on their watchlists. ϢereSpielChequers 23:04, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose—Amalgamating RFA and RFB into RFP would risk obscuring the fundamental differences between the processes, and increasing the proportion of editors requesting administrative rights prematurely. Mephistophelian (contact) 02:33, 2 November 2012 (UTC).
  • Oppose. I can't see how this would address any core issues with the current RfA system. In all honesty I see it as a solution looking for a problem. As one of the most regular admins working at PERM for the past few weeks, I am not aware of any backlogs; provided the applicants make their request correctly, they are processed within 24 hours. The main problem at PERM is unnecessary clerking and closure by new and/or inexperienced users.Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:34, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose - it won't actually fix any problems one might think exist on RFA. Instead of watching Wikipedia:Requests for adminship, people will just end up watching Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/administrator and Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/bureaucrat, now with the added result of making WP:PERM a much longer page whenever there's a request. It also won't actually have any effect on requests on the rest of WP:PERM as people would be watching the subpage and won't see the other requests. Then I also have to question the original assumption that WP:PERM "has backlog a lot of the time". Most of the time, un-handled requests occurs because of waiting for response for further information from requester rather than no admin dealing with it. KTC (talk) 09:49, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Community-wide scrutiny for Admin / 'Crat / Arbcom isn't the same thing as doling out selective user rights and require their own venue. I don't buy into the concept that a different venue provides a wider opportunity for comment. 250+ editors commented at a recent RFA. If all that is required is to boost viewers/contributors then simply post a link at Perm, Cent or where ever for each new RFA/B. Cannot see this proposal improving the volume of suitable Admin candidates and it is suitability that really matters in the end - not higher numbers of unsuitable candidates. Leaky Caldron 12:39, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • I said I'd try not to comment much more, but you are the second or third person to mention this. What is the problem with having RFAs of unsuitable candidates? Was PumpkinSky's unproductive? No, but he was determined unsuitable and he may run again in the future in the hopes of passing (which several people who opposed and were neutral said they would support). Who particularly cares about misguided users creating a botched RFA? They are fairly easily dealt with by speedily closing them and telling the user it takes a bit of effort and time to become an administrator and that they are not ready. If that is explained to them, maybe they will see it as something to aspire to attain later by working on what they need improved. I'm not sure I understand the logic of "it will produce more candidates, but no candidates is better". Surely the desolate page that is RFA (a majority of the time) is more scary to users who are suitable and unsuitable than 3-4 nominations of people who may or may not be ready. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 13:02, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • I totally agree with you about RFAs for unsuitable candidates, which is why I have objected to various & repeated attempts to set minimum entry levels and misguided efforts at metrics-based identification and pseudo pre-selection of candidates. Existing RFA guidelines are more than adequate and if wholly unsuitable candidates are (self) nominated and encounter rejection - tough. I just don't see how shifting the venue alters the probability of candidates presenting themselves. Leaky Caldron 13:39, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Unsuitable candidates must be discouraged, because a failed RfA can be somewhat emotionally devastating for some users, and there are many known cases of people who have retired after a failed RfA. Think about it: you volunteer your time here to improve this project, and you decide that you want to volunteer more of your time and do more work, so you ask for more tools. In response, people dredge up every last mistake you've ever made, cast aspersions on you, tell you that you're not good enough at what you do and you'll perhaps never be, and in some cases personally attack you and call you names. All in response to your request to volunteer more of your time. I briefly considered retirement after my first failed RfA, but instead just took a break for a few weeks to forget about it. The last thing we need is editors retiring because they were prematurely encouraged to try their luck at RfA, and subsequently got their ass handed to them. ‑Scottywong| prattle _ 14:26, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • So reading the considerable amount of existing RFA candidate guidance, knowledge of recent RFAs (which should be mandatory preparation) and, where relevant, guidance given by nominators is still not enough to deter an unsuitable volunteer? Personally I have few qualms about the community being able to dredge up examples of inadequate policy awareness or worse, dishonesty or other problematic behaviour. If we want the Admin selection process to be less trying the role should be either probationary and/or term limited. That way we are not stuck with a life time pig in a poke with no redress. Leaky Caldron 14:44, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • That's exactly what I'm talking about. You agree, or at least I think you do, that this forum is tied to all the things you mentioned: drudging up every mistake, casting aspersions, personal attacks, incivility, etc. WP:RFA is forever going to be tied with that, and there's no changing it as long as is it exists. No amount of reform can change it, because somehow, someone will skirt the guidelines and norms we set up to be nefarious. That is why we need to change the venue. We need to put a figurative bullet into the head of RFA, this notion that these things you are talking about are "just a part of the process". An editor walking away in retirement shouldn't be a part of the process that may happen, but it will always be if we permit this culture of "hellweek." RFA is about the person, and requests for permissions is about someone getting a permission. Personally, I think it's just time to stop looking at reforming RFA when RFA is never going to change. We can do this by simply giving less weight and argument to people who dredge up every mistake, by striking personal attacks like we do every place else and handling RFA like every other process. RFA as it is right now is its own animal where people can get away with it, so moving it shouldn't change the process (because the process that elects them works) it's the other bad stuff and fear surrounding the page that makes it not a normal Wikipedia process. My intention is that moving it to requests for permissions, makes it blend in with all the other permissions and that it ends up a non-hostile environment where editors don't feel kicked in the teeth when they leave. Of course there is no guarantee of this, but the risk factor is none. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 14:53, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • I can see your thinking and without being patronising I think it is well intentioned. But changing the venue isn't going to stop rigorous scrutiny. If that scrutiny sometimes gives the appearance of being aggressive (frequently due to over-enthusiastic supporters vilifying those who speak negatively about their candidates's credentials) how does changing the venue help fundamentally? Leaky Caldron 15:04, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • I think I've explained most of what I feel in above posts, so I don't want to repeat myself endlessly. In short, the scrutiny of a candidate is good, and like I said, the process itself works. This page, it's history, and the connotation behind RFA is a poisoned well though (it always will be). My intention is reform in the form of non-reform. By simply centralizing permissions to one page, we no longer single out RFA/B as important and it becomes a permission again just like any other. I think a month ago we had an RFC on reform in that we just start enforcing our normal site-wide policies and general behavior onto this forum, to just start "acting more appropriately", and this was universally supported. However, there was nothing to be done, because RFA was RFA so the RFC was dubbed useless but well-intentioned. This gives us a means to a new beginning. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 16:01, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
Your idea's just the sort of radical proposal RfA needs, and your reasoning is sound except the suggestion there's no risk. There's a big risk the RfA vibe would take over RfFM rather than the other way around. @Leaky, can you stop blaming it on the badgers?. Unwise badgering occasionally does more harm than good, but overall it would be more hurtful to candidates if opposers could expect to go unchallenged, and we'd have even less promotions. The blame for the state of RfA lies almost entirely with the serial opposers, and the solution will involve reducing their ability to veto quality candidates. FeydHuxtable (talk) 16:28, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
Unwise badgering always does more harm than good. The blame for the state of RFA rests with ill-prepared, hat collecting or occasionally otherwise unacceptable candidates garnering socially acquired, vacuous support for a role for life for which they may be unsuited. Leaky Caldron 16:38, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
I'm almost certain that any attempts to formalize RFPERM into an election would be shot down by the administrator that came by the assign or decline the request. That should have been done in the case of RFA, but there was so many people coming to comment, we had to create an order. It goes back to de-emphasizing RFA as important over other permissions. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 16:48, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
I think most everyone agrees that RfA needs major change, but it would be naive to believe that simply changing the page title would bring about any change whatsoever. ‑Scottywong| comment _ 18:01, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
  • How would you feel if RFP/admnistrator existed and instead of a transclusion, it was a ===header=== with a hyperlink to the RFA that people could click then read the RFA nomination? Would that change your !vote, because if KB of a page is really that important, my proposal can change for that. As for Townlake's oppose, I put little stock in it, personally. If RFA is a well-functioning page that shouldn't change, why is there talk of reform every week? The truth is, it's a horrible process, and though it does what it intends to do, that is not enough. The culture of RFA being a different set of buttons than the other permissions, which while true at present, is not a good thing. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 12:12, 3 November 2012 (UTC)
The notion that RFA would be a different process if it hijacked another page is absurd. And your last sentence directly above doesn't make any sense. This is a puzzling RFC.
Townlake (talk
) 17:25, 3 November 2012 (UTC)
  • You'll have to note that nothing in my proposal actually changes the support, oppose, formatting or process in determining consensus. Just seems like you're under the impression that one of those does, so I thought I'd comment. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 19:50, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
  • No, my point is that no changes are required or useful, including housing the process under a different page. Snowolf How can I help? 21:18, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Changing the name and/or location isn't going to make any difference. Axl ¤ [Talk] 10:49, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose Per Scottywong.--
    talk
    ) 19:38, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Process Status

  • I notice this process has been inactive since 22:30, 31 October 2012 (UTC).
  • I note that the merge proposal above will likely fail.

Will anyone be using this process in the next 14 days?

--

User:Radiant
isn't around anymore, I guess the question falls to me.

It probably will fail, but I got more support than I expected honestly. To answer you, probably not, since the last rush of nominations was probably to see if we could get a passing candidate before the month ended (to avoid two months of no successful candidates). Why do you ask? Regards, — Moe Epsilon 00:31, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Alright, in that case, I'll be back on or after 22:30, 13 November 2012 (UTC) (after 14 days of no use of page) --Kim Bruning (talk) 01:47, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
How mysterious. —
(❝?!❞)
12:33, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Eh? What's so mysterious. 14 days to see if this process is merely pining for the fjords seems like plenty of time to me. --Kim Bruning (talk) 16:01, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
I mean yes, suppose it is pushing up the daisies - what are you going to do? —
(❝?!❞)
19:01, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
We can make the fact official so we can do something constructive about it. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:13, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
14 days that a process goes unused seem to me completely void of any significance in this context. I bet we have plenty of processes that see activity way less often than that. Snowolf How can I help? 19:10, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
WP:DEADLINE. —Theopolisme
19:46, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
I was about to comment myself that RFA went largely went unused at all in September except for two nomination that were botched (31 days without a legitimate nomination). I'm confused as to what occurs in 14 days as well. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 19:55, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Heh, it's even worse off than I thought.
At any rate, this process seems to be unused and/or unsuccessful at the moment. We're supposed to do maintenance and shut down unused/broken processes, else Wikipedia becomes a mess after a while. RFA was clearly dieing this summer. I'm just trying to figure the correct moment to declare it properly dead. Normally one could just mark a process historical, and if anyone decides to reform and use it again, well fine. But RFA has been around for a long time and has always been somewhat special, so giving it a bit of time seems like the safe thing to do. 14 days from now seems fair enough. I can wait a month too if you like. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's see if anyone shows up anytime soon. --Kim Bruning (talk) 23:12, 4 November 2012 (UTC) note that being "somewhat special" does not mean that RFA gets a free pass in the long run. Esperanza and AMA also eventually got shut down, for similar reasons. Of course if RFA reforms and picks up steam, that's perfect too
I strongly disagree that the process is unused and/or unsuccessful. I don't know where you come off with this idea. It is clearly not unused, as we've stated processes are not required to be used daily or be deleted, that's quite an outlandish opinion if I may say so. Is it unsuccessful? I doubt it. Thousands of administrators have gone thru the process, and I don't see where it is unsuccessful in your personal opinion, perhaps you should explain why you feel that way that rather than state it as a fact. I have honestly no idea what you're going on about with this whole discussion. The idea that if people do not run for adminship for two weeks you decide that the process is broken is utterly laughable. Snowolf How can I help? 23:25, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Thousands, you say. That's plural. Are you sure?
And I agree that RFA worked in the past, but it doesn't seem to be working now. Previously, there were always multiple admins up on RFA at any time: at the time it was clearly and objectively "operational". Now there are 0 admins running: That's objectively "not operational". Of course that need not be a permanent status.
I think that (near to?) no successful promotions in 2 months followed by 14-31 days of no activity to be a fairly good ~ objective cutoff point, after which we can declare RFA dead (as opposed to merely 'pining for the fjords', as you are entitled to believe for now). No need to make a big fuss now, we'll see which of us is right in due time.
After 14(-31) days, if nothing has changed, I'll take this to the larger community and we'll see how the chips fall at that time. In the mean time, feel free to find new candidates for adminship, reform the process, or do whatever you think is a good idea. I'll abide by the situation on the ground and the consensus of the larger community. --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:10, 5 November 2012 (UTC) see eg.: Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Wikipedia:Esperanza. See also: User:Soap/RfA .
There are, I think, other Wikipedia processes more deserving than RfA that could use the Esperanza/messed rocker solution, KB. AFD (Deletion discussions should simply take place on article talk pages without all the bureaucracy) and FA (has many of the same issues Esperanza did) would top my list. - jc37 01:32, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, I prefer to do one thing at a time, and I'd promised some folks to look into RFA first. Also, I think RFA is easier to deal with atm, since it is now clearly no longer functioning (unlike AFD, for instance). In the mean time, if you yourself have time to spend on AFD and FA, feel free to look into it! --Kim Bruning (talk) 01:50, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I understand that "one thing at a time" thing. I have a list of community-wide discussions in queue, and am still trying to decide which one to queue up next : )
Leaning towards this one: Wikipedia:Requests for removal of adminship. - jc37 01:53, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I am not sure that lack of promotions shows anything about the process, nor does putting arbitrary timelines on it. If no admins are promoted, the shows a lack of worthy candidates, or a too high of a bar from the community. Let's face it, we're a fairly aging project, no longer with the intake of new recruits we used to have, at least in the same amounts. So most active users who are interested in the matter either have already run, have decided they don't want to or already are administrators. Now if you're suggesting we should go out and seek new candidates, I believe I have commented on this page about this as well. You see, to me the issue is with the community. When you get people saying that using IRC is reason enough to oppose somebody becoming an administrator, there's no process issue, there's a community issue. Snowolf How can I help? 01:44, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, if you put it that way, there's no possible way a process could ever be broken. It'd always be a community issue, a candidate issue, too high a bar issue; any issue, except an issue with the process at hand. I'm not buying that. You could keep explaining things away forever that way. :-P
If everything together (to wit: the sum total of activity on WP:RFA) is just not there, then I'm just going to call it like I see it. And the plain fact of the matter is that RFA has been near to death for quite some time now. Sooner or later we are going to have to recognize that fact. It's already rather late, in fact. We have to draw a line somewhere, right?  :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:00, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
If we mark RfA as historical, how are we going to promote new admins?
AutomaticStrikeout
02:07, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
(ec) How are we promoting new admins now? :-P The first step towards fixing a problem is recognizing that yes, we officially *have* a problem.
Once we get past that point, well, there have got to be at least 100 proposals on how to get more new admins up and about on Wikipedia. If RFA is marked historical, they'll all actually get the fighting chance they deserve --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:13, 5 November 2012 (UTC) or not, depending ;-)
Have an RfA at some other venue, whether at RFPERM, or AN, or some such. Deleting this process doesn't resolve anything save delete a page : ) - jc37 02:11, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Or we don't RfA at all and do Something Else (tm). I don't think I'm promoting Deletion per-se. ;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:13, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
(
AutomaticStrikeout
02:17, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I think the point is to recognize that the process is not working, or -at-least- process+community+venue is not working. It's just sort of sticking around and getting in the way of anyone trying anything new. So my proposal is to bring along a bugle and a flag, and give it a nice ceremony. --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:23, 5 November 2012 (UTC) And keep a spare, pure cedarwood stake behind our backs, just in case ;-)
Please don't mark RfA as historical. I think you'll find that you'd get quickly reverted if you did. If you believe that RfA needs to be changed (which probably puts you in the majority), then feel free to create a proposal that changes RfA and let's discuss it. But, don't artificially shut down RfA in an attempt to coerce editors to agree with proposals for change, out of fear. That would be like threatening to shut down the government to get your preferred legislation passed, and those kinds of politics aren't welcome here. ‑Scottywong| talk _ 14:57, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Actually, I think Kim has a point. (As opposed to a
WP:POINT
.) How many promotion-free months will there need to be before RfA is universally recognized to have keeled over and died? We might as well draw the line at Kim's proposed mark - two months without promotions followed by a month without activity.
RfA had its time, and a damn long one at that. (I remember when it arrived; an RL friend of mine, quercus robur, was the last person to get the bit via the mailing list.) It worked as well as it could during that time, and certainly had its ups and downs; but the community changed around it, and it no longer reflects a scale-appropriate way to select people to give the tools.
The problem all the reform attempts have had so far is that everyone here is incredibly stubborn. Because everyone sticks to their guns so hard, it's overwhelmed the ability to change. Having no active process for giving out the tools could change the balance, giving the advantage to the need for progress; people would have to start making compromises and working together to achieve consensus, or face being left in a totally unsustainable position.
Kim, this is a stroke of genius.
(❝?!❞)
15:35, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
@Scotty: there's a problem in your analogy. The difference between the debt-ceiling thing and this is that RfA a long-term problem (in that, because of RfA, we might not have enough admins at some point in the future to keep up with things),while the debt ceiling is a short-term problem (where the government shuts down the next day if the budget doesn't pass). We do have time to experiment with RfA; the encyclopedia won't come grinding to a halt tomorrow if we decide to try closing up shop for some added incentive for change. Worst comes to worst, we can always bring it back, and we won't have lost much. Really, though, how broken can RfA be if it let a schmuck like me get the tools? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 15:47, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I think we can safely state that the 'proposal' avenue is very nearly exhausted. People have been discussing "RFA Reform" for years, and it hasn't gone anywhere to date. Obstructionists have been playing the "please make a proposal, oh we'll vote it down now" game for years now (or so User:Kudpung was telling me this summer) . Mere reform proposals clearly aren't sufficient. It's time to knock this subsystem down and outright replace it by something that works. Actual Reform.
Now, despite what you may have been told, RFA is not essential to the workings of Wikipedia. Unlike the debt-ceiling crisis; nothing bad would happen for several years even if Wikipedia were in a vacuum. In fact, in reality, Wikipedia is part of a larger movement, and a lack of a local RFA process (which is de facto the case at the moment anyway) just means that that aspect of rights-management will fall back on Stewards directly. (There's the small detail that we'd still have bureaucrats, but since locking RFA means they're effectively deposed from that role, I don't think anyone would deny the stewards may step in)
So we're never going to be in any kind of trouble. We'll just be less autonomous for a little while while we sort things out.
The missing element is that currently we still have an RFA. Officially marking RFA as historical will at least free up the Stewards to act to some degree. They are only permitted to act in a limited capacity, but even that has got to be an improvement on the status quo. :-P
The 'Historical' tag is very much like the process-equivalent of a PROD, anyone may place it, and anyone may remove it. Of course, if the historical tag gets removed (and the process still clearly isn't working), then anyone may also list the page at MFD as an "esperanzafy".
The alternative you propose effectively means that we leave the rudder jammed and stay the current course while we discuss our options in committee indefinitely. "Oh look, is that an iceberg I see on yonder horizon?"
A solution doesn't need to be perfect-in-one-go. It just needs to miss the icebergs and allow further steering as we spot more.
--Kim Bruning (talk) 15:49, 5 November 2012 (UTC) The fact that even just MFDing RFA probably meets our criterion is telling :-P What have folks been up to while I was away? %-)
I completely agree that this system needs to be replaced, I completely agree that we as a community have failed to accomplish this task and have proven at this point without a shadow of a doubt incapable of doing it. I also agree that it need not be the perfect solution at once but we must try something. I also agree that the obstructionists will likely continue to prevail in blocking any attempts at reform. Its really a shame and is largely the reason I quite editing. I see many way's of fixing it but I know that the community will never ever achieve a consensus. Too many have too much too lose and they will fight with all their will and use whatever justifications they can to keep what they have. 138.162.0.44 (talk) 16:29, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I think you'd be hard pressed to find a lot of people who don't agree that RfA is broken. We don't need to convince people that RfA is broken, we need to come to an agreement on what's the best way to change/replace RfA. So far, that hasn't happened. It's not necessarily true that "obstructionists" are hindering progress. It may just be that it's a hard problem to solve, and perhaps there is no ideal solution.
The answer is most certainly not to just pull the plug on RfA in order to rush through changes. You're frustrated that the proposal process hasn't produced anything yet. Your solution is basically to say "Ok, whatever the next proposal is, we're going to go with that for awhile and see what happens." The right way to solve the problem in the long term is not to make hasty changes just because you don't like the current situation. The right way is to continue on the current course and wait for a proposal to come along that has a lot of support.
Your own argument above is contradictory. You say that RfA is hopelessly broken and we need change now, yet at the same time you say that there wouldn't be major problems if no new admins were promoted for several years. It's as if you're saying "Oh look, is that an iceberg I see on the satellite photos, 3000 miles away from our current position? Well, no sense in leaving the rudder jammed on the current course while we decide what to do, let's just turn 90 degrees to the right and see where that leads us." We've got time to find a good solution, there's no sense in rushing something through and getting stuck with something that is worse or no better than the current situation. ‑Scottywong| comment _ 17:53, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I'm not here to make changes to RFA, rushed or not. That's Someone Else 's problem. Actually, wait, maybe it's not. Someone Else failed to fix it on time, and now RFA looks pretty dead. If RFA is indeed dead, my contribution will be to bury it.
We're not quite ready for the postmortem, but I would suggest that the root cause may be found to have something to do with the "proposal process" used: we can empirically establish that it did not work. One of the recommendations going forward might be to not use that particular proposal process.
But that's getting ahead of ourselves. Let's make sure RFA is well and truly dead first. We don't want to bury it alive, after all!
--Kim Bruning (talk) 21:50, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Nobody has run for 2 weeks, so that means it's dead? What malarky! I have a convertible that I park in a heated storage unit all winter...it doesn't stop being a car during that time...it's simply that it's not needed during the current environment. Most...bizarre...logic...ever. --(
BWilkins←✎
) 22:29, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Ha! That would be funny. But it's a bit more involved than that. :-)
Tell you what, what would your criterion be to call something a failed process? Then, look at User:Soap/RfA and tell me if that meets your criterion yet, or how far it still needs to go.
--Kim Bruning (talk) 22:47, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Why don't you try running, Kim? If you want to have a good perspective on what the process is like, going through it can help you get that perspective.
AutomaticStrikeout
23:18, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
WP:100 RFA nomination: Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/Bishonen. --Kim Bruning (talk
) 23:28, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, it's certainly interesting to see how the process has changed over the years! However, as far as I can tell, you aren't still an admin, so you could run again.
AutomaticStrikeout
23:39, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
(ec) I handed in the bit as an admin in good standing. My reason at the time was to prove that people don't actually need an admin bit to be an admin (and in fact it took something like 6 months before people noticed I didn't have it ;-)). I am allowed to request the bit back at any time.
But... I've now had quite some years of practice in dealing with situations without needing an admin bit. Even if I wanted/needed it back at this late juncture, any bureaucrat would provide it to me without a need for RFA. If I did rerun, most people would (rightly) consider it unnecessary process. --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:04, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Kim, you're preaching to the choir. I don't know of very many people who think that RfA isn't fatally flawed. But it's all we've got at this point. Declaring it dead would accomplish nothing more than allowing you to make a symbolic gesture. We don't need symbolic gestures at this point, we need actual solutions. Changing the title of the RfA page (as suggested in the thread above) or slapping a historical template on the top of the page is not a solution, it's an emotional overreaction. Why don't you pretend that the historical template is already on the page, and then proceed from there. What would you propose as an actual solution once RfA is declared dead? ‑Scottywong| yak _ 23:46, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
(ec) If you read the responses so far, you'll see it's 50/50 or so. Some people say I'm preaching to the choir, but some people think there isn't any problem at all (in fact, I just E/Ced with one ;-) , and don't see any point in moving on. The number of people who don't want to move on exist in sufficient numbers to block any consensus to get RFA fixed. That's part of what's been happening these past 2-3 years. So I'm doing a standard User:Radiant!-style cleanup, since Radiant isn't around to do it for us anymore. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:04, 6 November 2012 (UTC) Essentially, RFA isn't working anyway, and it turns out that Wikipedia doesn't actually explode when RFA isn't working. That means that in the end we can just clean it up. That leaves us one less bureaucratic process to wonk over.
Yes, RfA/RfB is likely dead. But we might be able to rejuvenate it, at least temporarily, by finding quality candidates and encouraging them to run. I challenge the capable non-admins who see this post to seriously consider running for adminship. I challenge the qualified admins reading this to run for cratship. Instead of giving up and declaring the process dead, let's at least give it one last chance.
AutomaticStrikeout
23:55, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Y'know, I think I like your attitude. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 06:11, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Come back to me this time next year and we'll talk. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 19:47, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
It`s nowhere close to dead. It`s at the jump-off point for repair. People are ``afraid`` of the current process (
BWilkins←✎
) 23:58, 5 November 2012 (UTC)

Scottywong seems to believe that most people think that RfA is "broken". I do not believe that RfA is broken. (I assume that "broken" here means "doesn't work".) There are problems with RfA, and adjustment of some aspects may be helpful. However RfA does promote good candidates (although not necessarily all good candidates) and fails poor candidates. I believe that RfA will continue to do so in the future. Axl ¤ [Talk] 11:17, 6 November 2012 (UTC)

It is now just after 22:30, 13 November 2012 (UTC). There have been 2 uses of the page in the given period: one RFA failed, and another is undecided. The RFA process itself seems to remain flexible, and to allow people to participate and make their opinions known clearly. The content of those opinions, however, does not always seem to be optimally geared towards reaching a decision on whether or not someone could be an admin.
It appears to me that this process will continue to decline in usage as long as this situation persists.
I will next check in on 13 December 2012. --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:31, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Problem statement

Any solution begins with figuring out what the problem is. In the thread above, Bwilkins says that "people are ``afraid`` of the current process". I think that's accurate. The next obvious question is, why are they afraid? I'll start a list of possible reasons below, feel free to add to it:

  • The bar has gotten too high, people believe they are unqualified.
  • The bar has gotten too high, people believe their RfA will be opposed because of minor negative events in their editing history.
  • The attitude at RfA has gotten too corrosive, people don't want to publicly subject themselves to rude and abrasive comments about their behavior.

Any others? Once we've properly defined the problem, solutions should be forthcoming. ‑Scottywong| prattle _ 01:07, 6 November 2012 (UTC)

As I already noted below, this is my take on it. As long as RfA is building itself into a culture of fear, then there will be those who will be concerned about subjecting themselves to such. Monty Python may have said "No one expects a Spanish Inquisition", but at RfA, we kinda do, unfortunately... - jc37 02:34, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
I would agree with both Scotty and jc37.
AutomaticStrikeout
02:39, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
I suspect that some people are put off going through RfA due to the constant harping on here and elsewhere about how terrible it is. How about giving the 'RfA is broken' threads a rest for 6 months, simply ignoring comments in RfAs that one disagrees with rather than allowing them to dominate the process by arguing with them over and over, and seeing if this improves things? --Michig (talk) 06:48, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Look, I can give my personal view. I am fully qualified to be admin, have a track record of three years of active adminship on a different project, and I would probably pass an RfA. On the other hand, would it be a pleasant experience? Getting comments like "You have 90% of edits in the articles, better stay writing articles, I do not trust you with the mop", or "In my opinion, it is crucial for an admin to have flawless English, please come in 6 months", or "In December 2011, you reverted a vandal edit and failed to notify the IP. This means you just do not understand the process. May be I could support you in a year, but not now", or (my favorite) "Please remind me why should I care about your opinion?". Well, just reading all this shit, you know, I am not a hat collector, and I guess people who know me also know I am a team player - I participate in the drives and I am willing to do parts of the job other people can not or are unwilling to do, and I do not ask for anything - but, you know, getting all these negative comments, even if they are in minority, for my WILLINNESS TO CLEAN UP THE SHIT - sorry, I can live without the mop, Wikipedia is my hobby, and I am pretty much successfull in my profession. Even despite this, I could still consider running, if there are real backlogs on a regular basis - but my attitude is that Wikipedia needs that I have the tools more that I need this, so why should I force it? Probably it falls under "too corrosive", but I think there are more facets that just this.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:26, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
In July & August there were 10 successful, high calibre candidates who were virtually unopposed. The problem is clearly therefore not the existing process. The (self) nomination of some weaker candidates, often systematically supported very quickly by wiki friends, creates an unreasonable expectation early on. Evidence then revealed during RFA that they are either not as good as initial support appears to suggest, or simply not yet acceptable based on a whole range of valid criteria, leads to the "atmosphere". Better initial questions and an embargo on !votes until at least those have been answered would create a less biased, and IMO, a fairer platform for subsequent community scrutiny. Leaky Caldron 14:25, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
What do you call valid criteria? I remember one candidate got dozens of opposes because of their username. Is this a valid criterion? There is a user who pledged to oppose candidates with FAs and GAs - is this may be a valid criterion?--Ymblanter (talk) 14:40, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
It is perfectly valid when dozens of editors, even including some supporters, agree that it is a valid concern. 'Crats determine what !votes should be discounted and a single oppose of the kind you suggest would not be influential. Leaky Caldron 14:54, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
As a more positive statement - actually, I believe if there were some formal criteria, things would go better, since they would initially filter out unsuitable candidates. However, the community consistently refused to install such criteria, such as, for instance, a number of edits a candidate has to collect before becoming eligible. And the arguments to not have criteria also have some merits.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:56, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
The community does a fine job already in filtering out unsuitable candidates. Additional fixed criteria are not necessary. Good candidates will sail through artificial hurdles and bad ones will pass with false expectation of success in the actual RFA. There is sufficient good RFA guidance on what the community requires of Admins without setting targets such as minimum edit counts. Leaky Caldron 15:04, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, fine, if everything is as perfect as you describe, why is the number of incoming admins several times as small as the number of outgoing ones?--Ymblanter (talk) 15:07, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
I'll repeat what I said earlier, 10 successful candidates in 2 months with barely an oppose between them doesn't strike me as being indicative of a fundamentally broken process. Leaky Caldron 15:12, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
You're cherry picking the two best months of the year and ignoring the rest, like an ostrich with its head in the sand. There were 10 successful candidates in July and August of this year. There were 11 successful candidates throughout the remainder of the year (so far). 21 total promotions this year. If we're lucky in the remaining 7-8 weeks of this year, we'll get 5 more admins promoted which would get us to half of the successful RfA's we had last year (52). In 2010, there were 75. In 2009, there were 121. In 2008, there were 201. So yes, while 10 promotions in two consecutive months is not a bad thing, it's not telling the whole story. In 2011, there were two consecutive months with 18 promotions. In 2010, there were two consecutive months with 20 promotions. In 2009, there were two consecutive months with 27 promotions. Given the data that shows a clear trend, do you still believe that RfA needs no modification? ‑Scottywong| squeal _ 15:26, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
Some modest changes to prevent early pile on !votes, better questions answered before !voting opens. Why would 40 people vote for or against anyone before they have answered a single additional question? Above all better candidates, not "popular" choices determined off-wiki. Leaky Caldron 15:42, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
So, all we need to do to turn around RfA participation rates (that have been declining steadily for 6 consecutive years) is make sure that question 4 has been asked and answered before voting begins? Why hasn't anyone thought of that before? And how do we find these "better", unpopular candidates? ‑Scottywong| comment _ 16:38, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
  • RfA is too unpredictable and arbitrary.

This fourth element is perhaps just as important as the first three reasons identified by Scotty, though less obvious. As even Axl admits above, "not necessarily all good candidates" are promoted. True but understated. Any RfA can potentially be derailed by an impressive looking oppose. If a determined opposer spends enough time, it's almost inevitable that they'll be able to find dozens of mistakes which they can highlight with diffs (There are studies that suggest the average paid worker makes about 5-7 mistakes per hour. Even folk good enough to be get to president make public gaffs, despite them having dedicated teams who try to prevent this. )

Even miraculously perfect candidates can be made to look bad, due a trilemma I like to call the 'RfA impossible trinity'. Its impossible for a candidate not to be vulnerable to at least one of these three criticisms: 1> that they haven't done any substantial content work. 2> a plausible charge that they are a plagiarist or at least a close paraphraser. 3> Assuming that they always use substantially different wording to the sources, a plausible charge that they engage in Original Research. Granted, badgers could argue against the charges, but few voters seem to attentively consider what badgers have to say, with some even saying that extensive badgering makes them more likely to oppose.

Potential candidates sense this and are right to be "afraid" of the current process. No matter how much they've contributed or have to offer, some random opposser with time on their hands has a good chance of trashing their wiki-reputation, or at least causing them to be "rejected by the community". It's impossible to know in advance if an RfA will escape this sort of opposition. And with the 70% threshold meaning an oppose has equal weight to three supports, its challenging for even the most capable badgers to defend them. FeydHuxtable (talk) 19:10, 6 November 2012 (UTC)

As promised, I've started drafting something I suggested earlier, but including some comments I received. It will include:
  • no voting for first 3 days
  • larger set of original questions for the candidate
  • opportunity for additional questions during those first 3 days
  • no threaded discussions
  • word limit on !votes
  • RFA clerking to ensure the above all works smoothly
More to come (
BWilkins←✎
) 00:17, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Could I suggest a "maximum number of edits a user can make" - besides the candidate, I see no reason for a single editor to make more than 10-15 edits to an RfA. In my opinion, if an editor has made more edits to an RfA than the candidate, that's clear disruption. WormTT(talk) 09:12, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
I like this having advocated similar in the past. The only one I would modify is allowing limited threaded discussions (say one response from the candidate or other editor followed by the OP's response with any extended discussion removed to the talk page). How are you planning to take this forward? Leaky Caldron 11:00, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Looks promising, I hope your package might also include a reduction of the 70% threshold. FeydHuxtable (talk) 11:57, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Or abolish the threshold altogether, and give the crats the ability to assess the actual consensus at RfA, weighing the strength of arguements, old school style. ‑Scottywong| confabulate _ 17:27, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
BWilkins, I'm glad you're taking it upon yourself to draft this proposal. My only suggestion would be to accompany each proposed change to RfA with a detailed description of what problem it is intended to solve. There are a few bullet points in your brief list above that confuse me slightly, but I'd like to see your reasoning for why, for example, it would be good to disallow voting for the first 3 days, or why there needs to be more default questions. Thanks. ‑Scottywong| soliloquize _ 17:31, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

Scotty...just saw your comments, and I'll take those into account shortly. See

BWilkins←✎
) 16:35, 8 November 2012 (UTC)

These look like good ideas. I also agree that the threshold may need reducing or doing away with. I am a little hesitant to support the no threading at this time however. If we allow more than one question why would we not allow discussion?--
talk
) 19:45, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Why aren't people participating in Requests for adminship/Northamerica1000?

Just wondering why some wikipans are participating on this talk page but not in an actual RFA? Ottawahitech (talk) 20:59, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps because there's no point as the result of that RFA is obvious, and has been for some days; if it was borderline, there might be more of an incentive to comment (in either direction) but I doubt that there's anything new to say that hasn't already been said.
BencherliteTalk
21:05, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
There's no point in piling on opposition to an RfA that is already a foregone conclusion. ‑Scottywong| chatter _ 21:22, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Agreed. Also, and I haven't looked to see if it's the case here, but people may skip participating in an RFA if the outcome is clear and they are afraid that by participating, they might create more enemies in the future. MBisanz talk 21:31, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
A very shrewd comment. Xxanthippe (talk) 23:33, 13 November 2012 (UTC).
Ah, the wonders of Wikipolitics : ) - jc37 21:38, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
  • @MBisanz, Correct me if I am wrong, but I think what you are saying is that wikipans do not participate in
    wp:RFAs when they percieve that they may be "punished" for supporting/opposing the wrong candidate? Ottawahitech (talk
    ) 20:04, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
  • No, I think he's saying that when people are certain that there is no possible benefit (to the candidate or the project) from them participating in a particular RfA, but a conceivable possible negative (to themselves and/or the project) from them participating, then they might act (or not act) accordingly. --
    talk
    ) 20:14, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
  • I didn't because I didn't notice. I had this page on my watchlist, and noticed his name in the edit summary, so went and stated my support. Dream Focus 21:34, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
  • The main reason is time, which I will bring up to reprise a suggestion of mine from before. If I know an editor moderately well, I can do my due diligence with a modest amount of additional work. So I will. If I don't know them, I feel obligated to check a number of things, and that takes time, maybe a couple hours, although this is still surface review. I have so many things I want to do, it is extremely rare I can justify a couple hours taken away from Copyright review, Commons image deletion review or article writing. However, it doesn't take me a couple hours to share my two cents on a proposal in this forum. I've suggested before, and will suggest again, we ought to get organized, where editors sign up to review an aspect of a candidate (e.g. first 2k content edits, second 2k content edits, all CSDs, all AfDs, all ANI comments…) and report results. The current culture that everyone spot checks whatever they choose is mind-bogglingly inefficient.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 21:00, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
  • 114 people participated. Looking at recent unsucessful RfAs that went the full distance, I see 128 (QuiteUnusual), 74 (Theopolisme), 90 (Kumioko 2) so 114 seems "normal". If you compare to successful RfAs, you see a few that have less than 100 total votes recently as well. The turn out here was very much in the middle of expectations. I would posit that the premise is faulty. We do get a few more votes with successful candidacies, but that is no biggie, it is human nature to want to jump on the bandwagon of a winning team, no harm is done. We discourage people from piling on in an oppose situation, but not in a support situation, for example. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © Join WER 17:32, 18 November 2012 (UTC)
    I think pile-on support is certainly much less harmful than pile-on oppose. Having gone through two RfA that were clearly failing, one as a candiate & one as a nom, I can say with experience that pile-on opposes are frustrating.
    AutomaticStrikeout
    01:38, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Different types of Reviews and Checks to be done before nominating someone else for Adminship

Hello everyone. I would like to know that what are the different types of reviews and checks that need to be done before nominating someone else for Adminship ? I see a number of users on Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls which can be quite confidently nominated for Adminship if they agree. Just wanted input from my fellow experienced Wikipedians on different ways on which to evaluate possible candidates, as I think that it would be pretty much time consuming if I were to check each and every edit of people which are typically thousands in number. All kinds of helpful suggestions are welcomed. TheGeneralUser (talk) 16:13, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

User:Scottywong/Admin hopefuls might be interesting for you. ‑Scottywong| prattle _ 16:57, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
Wow Scotty, with 400, 000+ plus edits across all namespaces, over a dozen featured pieces of contect, created over 100 articles, work on Protected content like templates, voting and even closing things like AFD's/MFD's an CFD's and all the other things I have done I didn't even make the list at all in negative numbers? That seems pretty suspicious to me.
talk
) 02:41, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
Kumioko, your contributions are not the whole picture. There's also the many times when you have lost the faith of the community. Binksternet (talk) 02:44, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
I think it would behoove you to read that those on the list were only from Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls. --Izno (talk) 02:54, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
Oh thanks Izno. I didn't see that I thought it was just a top numbers list.
talk
) 03:28, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
Perhaps "not jumping to outlandish conclusions" should be another bullet point on the list of desired traits for admins? You can always see your own score by searching yourself using the tool. Your current score is 584 out of a possible 1000. It takes the tool quite awhile to figure out your score, since you have such a large edit count and article creation count. The only negatives it finds are that you have a low number of edits to admin areas (AIV/RFPP/AfD), and your lowest monthly edit count in the last 12 months is 0. ‑Scottywong| verbalize _ 20:05, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
Investigating the user's every contribution isn't expected or realistic, and the standards for nomination are indefinite, but you should get a reasonable idea of what you're looking for in §2.3 and §2.4 of the guidance. Mephistophelian (contact) 17:08, 23 November 2012 (UTC).
See mine if you want another perspective. Pharmboy (alt. of Dennis Brown) 02:04, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
It's also useful to search for their username in the AN/I archives to see if there are any skeletons. Kaldari (talk) 12:18, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
The template I use at my RFA review page uses this [1] which allows searching all the boards. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © Join WER 20:13, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
There are a number of things that !voters like to see, and some things they don't want to see. I'd suggest that you check both to see if you'd be happy to support someone, and whether you think they would pass RFA. To save time I'd recommend doing the easy checks first. I first look to see if they are currently active and have a block log that's been clean for 12 months. ϢereSpielChequers 15:57, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

New chart

As my charting of admin activity enters its fourth year, here is a new chart to debate. Have fun. MBisanz talk 06:25, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

Nice. I had noticed that the "number of active admins" has been dropping, but it's interesting to see it as a chart. - jc37 06:41, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
  • Would be easier to interpret if the vertical axis started at zero. -- Scray (talk) 14:12, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
Aside from giving us an absolute number this data cannot be interpreted. What is the definition of "active", for example. Average Admin edits per day over time is the only way to determine if there is a reduction in overall Admin. productivity, and therefore the makings of a potential issue, not just a perceived, unproven and unquantified one. Leaky Caldron 14:39, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
Agree with LC - is this active as an admin i.e. admin tasks, or active as an editor in general? I can go a number of days without doing anything moppish, and I'm sure others are even longer (I know one highly active editor who resigned as an admin as he wasn't doing anything with the tools and didn't see the need for them!) but I'm still making upwards of 1500 edits a month. GiantSnowman 14:58, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
I can't empathise with the uncertainty, as Matthew's definition is explicit in his description on Commons and corresponds exactly to the one provided for the English Wikipedia's list of inactive administrators:
"Using data from RickBot I created a graph of the number of active administrators, defined as having 30 or more edits in the last 60 days, and plotted that over the last several years on enwiki. I had to remove some data points when there were database errors, but the data is included on the talk page for review."
"There are 1,453 (as of now) administrator accounts (active and otherwise), 655 of them active (as of 2012-11-23). Activity is defined as 30 or more edits during the last two months." Mephistophelian (contact) 15:13, 23 November 2012 (UTC).
And whereabouts on this thread does it state that? GiantSnowman 15:17, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
Nowhere. Presumably Mephistophelian got to that the exact same way I did. By clicking on the image. Not hard, man. —
(❝?!❞)
15:26, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
P.S.
(❝?!❞)
15:31, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
An explanation from the start would be helpful for the slower amongst us, n'est pas? GiantSnowman 15:36, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
Yeah, I guess. —
(❝?!❞)
15:47, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
Active editors ≥100 edits/month vs active administrators ≥30 edits/month
  • I'm not sure how useful this data is in isolation. I'd like to see it plotted against the number of active Wikipedians as measured at here; although those numbers only offer figures for editors making ≥5 edits/month and ≥100 edits/month, not the ≥30 edits/month used as a metric here. —
    (❝?!❞)
    17:16, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
  • In the process of doing this; plotting it against editors who make ≥100 edits/month. ≥5 is far too many editors and that is not nearly enough activity to consider them truly active. The metric of ≥30 edits/month for administrators will stay the same. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 20:19, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
  •  Done Regards, — Moe Epsilon 21:58, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
  • After looking threw the data, it appears that, despite the appearance of the two lines on the graph I created, the line plot for active administrators is falling more drastically than the number of editors with over 100 edits. We've only lost 28% of the number of editors since it's peak on March 2008, while we have lost almost exactly 33% (1/3) of the number of administrators since it's peak in February 2008. A similar rate (neither are particularly good) but losing a section of the community that we have granted rights to slightly quicker than the average editor is a little disconcerting. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 02:43, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
  • I'm pretty sure that this isn't just a retention matter. Yes the number of active admins is declining faster than the number of active editors, but it isn't that we are losing admins faster than we lose other active editors, if anything the admins tend to stick around longer. The problem is that we aren't recruiting new admins anything like as fast as we are recruiting new active editors. What should be happening is that as the community matures an increasing proportion of our active editors should be admins, as our problems with editor recruitment mean that a dwindling proportion of our active editors are relativenewcomers who don't yet meet the criteria for adminship. But instead we have the reverse, and a growing proportion of our active editors are old hands who have the experience to be admins but are not admins. That's pretty much a recipe for conflict between the admins and the community. ϢereSpielChequers 17:12, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
This - "a growing proportion of our active editors are old hands who have the experience to be admins but are not admins. That's pretty much a recipe for conflict between the admins and the community." - is one of the best short statements I have seen about the problem. Of course, that can be partially solved by encouraging (since there is no mechanism to insist) admins to differentiate in their "style" between those "old hands" and the newer editors. It's not unlike the work environment, where often new junior admin staff need to deal with long standing employees. I've always found a good way to approach that if you are the junior admin person is to ask the experienced guy to help you with your problem, because 9 times out of 10 he'll help you to do what you wanted to do anyway - doesn't always work, but when it does, everyone feels involved, and you get the result you want, so it's nearly always worth trying. The key thing there I think is that Joe LongTerm hates being told, but loves to be asked for advice. But, since there is no body or structure responsible for overseeing or even advising admins, this sort of thing is ridiculously hard to introduce, and each admin will continue to set his own rules of engagement, knowing he is free to do so unless he upsets enough people to become one of the handful who get hauled up for a public flogging. I'd probably do exactly the same thing myself. Begoon talk 17:36, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

It should be noted that this chart assumes that edits = admin actions and it doesn't. Just because an admin is active does not mean they are actively doing administrative things. In fact many to most editors with the admin tools rarely use them. Its the same 50 or so that are the ones doing the admin tasks.

talk
) 20:30, 23 November 2012 (UTC)

Not sure where you come up with the 50 number. However, I just wanted to note that an admin can perform an administrative task without using any tools. I just closed a report at
WP:ANEW without taking any administrative action. However, my closure is unquestionably an administrative task.--Bbb23 (talk
) 21:08, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
I admit the 50 was an arbitrary number but the point is its the same relative few doing 90+% of the admin related work. 90% of the admins who have the tools rarely use them. Although I agree that closing a report is an admin task it doesn't require the admin tools and can be done by anyone. I am referring to those things that require the tools like deleting, protecting, blocking and the like. I would be interested to see some numbers based on the logs of those actions to see what the numbers look like.
talk
) 02:47, 24 November 2012 (UTC)
The fifty most active admins since December 2004 have done over 30,000 admin actions each. But there are hundreds more admins who have made a thousand or more admin actions and the 50 most active admins in any one month are unlikely to be the same, they certainly won't be the same as the fifty most active of all time.
Wikipedia:ADMINSTATS has cumulative totals covering the last eight years, but it would help if we had something more detailed. It should be possible both to work out how many admins are currently active as admins, and also how good our coverage is around the clock. My assumption is that the problem will get to the point where we have to do something when we start getting the occasional admin free hour at AIV. I don't know how soon that will be, but I assume that when that happens the community will overreact and appoint a large batch of poorly considered candidates. My preference of course is that we reform RFA first, but I have little confidence in our doing so. ϢereSpiel
Chequers 16:17, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
I'm not sure, but I think the time has come: take a look. The Anonymouse (talk • contribs) 17:22, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

All together now

There is an old joke that there are actually only 5 editors of Wikipedia, and all the accounts are merely socks of those 5. (After all, on the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog.)

So I suppose the thought above about only a small percentage of admins do the admin work must mean that only one of the 5 is interested in admin duties? And obviously that, only a part of their editing activities? Perhaps the other 4 might find a way to motivate #5 to help out more with those admin duties. (Or vice-versa : ) - jc37 18:57, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Much as the
(❝?!❞)
19:11, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Creating Wikipedia space equivalent of User:NoSeptember/RfA voting records - yea or nay?

I was thinking of

WP:100, but I don't feel like it really goes far enough in covering historically significant RfAs (or RfBs). The page I'm thinking of creating would be largely based on User:NoSeptember/RfA voting records; I have already gotten NoSeptember's permission to do so (as seen here
).

Thoughts? Kurtis (talk) 02:23, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea. I nominate Kurtis for Chief Record Creator and will get the hand-truck to start moving the boxes to his place. MBisanz talk 02:27, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
I like the idea, if we also split the WP:100 stuff to there (replacing with a template:see also), and thus cutting down on that page's size. Also, let's change the name: Wikipedia:List of times that 100 Wikipedians contributed to an RFX (That way we can include RfB : ) - jc37 02:36, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
@Mbisanz — Ah, why the hell not? =)
@Jc37 — That might also be a good idea. Very pleased to see some folks are on board with me. =D Kurtis (talk) 03:41, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
I might be interested in helping, but I'm not clear on what your objective is here.
AutomaticStrikeout (Evidence
) 04:13, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
Here's a preliminary split:
I didn't use jc37's suggested title for the RFX page because that would also require every RFX with ≥100 votes, not just ≥100 supports. —
(❝?!❞)
12:11, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
The name I chose was because the NoSeptember stats that Kurtis mentioned included opposes : ) - jc37 17:16, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
Yup. Just wanted to make it clear that I was working with what
(❝?!❞)
13:14, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
Simple: A place to keep RfA/RfB participation records. =) Kurtis (talk) 22:56, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
Do you mean voter participation or candidate participation?
AutomaticStrikeout (Evidence
) 23:20, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
Based on raw numbers of participants per RfX, AutomaticStrikeout; not as a means of gauging any individual's contribution history to RfA. Kurtis (talk) 00:50, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
Ok, so what might I be able to do to help?
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 02:52, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Nomination data and its subpage Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Nomination data/All RfA nominations might be fantastic blue links to use. What is really needed is a freaking index of all the data and tables. Some is collected in the archives here, random pages there in Wikipedia space, but which is never indexed or archived in an easily accessible manner. --Izno (talk) 03:10, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
A category is probably what is needed here. We have Category:Matters related to requests for adminship and category:Wikipedia statistics. What we need is category:Statistics related to requests for adminship. ϢereSpielChequers 23:49, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
That seemed not to fix the issue to me (or at least not in its entirety). There is a lot of information posted on this talk page which is not reflected on other pages, and unless you see benefit (I don't) in categorizing the talk pages, that doesn't fix the only problem identified. --Izno (talk) 23:54, 27 November 2012 (UTC)
There is a separate issue here. If we have a page of stats that matters it should not just be in an archive of a talkpage, it should be on a page in its own right. This is especially true with RFA stats because things change and we probably want to keep updating those stats, and if they only exist in the archive of a talkpage then you can't update them unless you move them. ϢereSpielChequers 00:40, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
Agreed. Still, I don't think a category solves the other issue completely, per
WP:CLN. --Izno (talk
) 02:09, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
We also need something which tells us when these various pages were last updated. That could be done by a guide to the various guides and stats, or it could be done by creating diverse subcategories category:Statistics related to requests for adminship, updated 2006 through category:Statistics related to requests for adminship, updated 2012. Ideally the various discussions in these archives should be linked to their respective talkpages, though I can think of many more worthwhile ways to spend the time that would take. ϢereSpielChequers 09:07, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
Push come to shove, the page's edit history tells you when it was last updated. Not ideal, but it works.
talk
) 22:34, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
That doesn't necessarily tell you how up-to-date a table or set of statistics are. More importantly it doesn't help organise a large number of pages of stats, whereas a bit of categorisation would, and in a way that someone updating such a page would intuitively grasp. By contrast it is not intuitive to update a completely separate page to say that graph x has been updated and now includes 2011 data. ϢereSpielChequers 23:35, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Cmach7

You may have noticed that

(❝?!❞)
13:12, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I'd seen that. Not sure what can be done, though. It's his decision whether to return to editing articles or to prefer to try for adminship. --Yngvadottir (talk) 13:20, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
Ultimately we can only judge people by their contributions to Wikipedia. If their actions are disruptive, then they need to be dealt with fairly, in accordance with the same policies that apply to everyone else. We can be sympathetic to the reasons for disruptive behaviour, but can't let it continue. I am not saying Cmach7 is disruptive, I am just commenting on the general point.
TalkQu
15:20, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
Of course I'm not suggesting we should let it continue. I'm just suggesting, you know, that we're capable of being thoughtful, kind and understanding in the way we deal with problems. Part of that is being contextually aware. —
(❝?!❞)
16:36, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
Cmach7 clearly wants an RFA, if they ever manage to get a properly formatted RFA put together, I say we respect their desire and let it run until there are either a few feet of snow, or its withdrawn. Monty845 16:51, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
I don't think it would harm us to humor him by allowing him to run an RfA. My concern is that it might harm him if he gets seriously snowed. However, if we stop it after just a few opposes, he might not think he was given a fair chance. Perhaps if/when he tries again, a couple of people can kindly !vote in the support section as moral support as that might make it a little bit less painful. I would say don't do anything for the time being, wait for him to try it again and then maybe transclude it properly for him and let him run.
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 21:49, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

I'd be inclined to consider a

WP:CIR block should this happen again, considering that this is not the only problem that the user has been involved in. --Rschen7754
21:54, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

I agree with this. Offering as a token gesture an inevitable snow/not close now after a few !votes will not benefit this particular editor one iota. Consider a note to the alleged mother's IP address. Leaky Caldron 22:13, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
I disagree with the suggestion to let a nomination go live; I think it would be cruel to subject this user to the inevitable pounding if his RfA goes public. A lot of commenters would not understand the situation and would not "be kind"; when was there ever a kind RfA? I'd hate to seem him get subjected to the gauntlet that greets even the most qualified nominees here. We could just keep taking down his malformed nominations - or what about a topic block of this topic, so that he can't keep nominating himself but can continue to work on content? --MelanieN (talk) 22:53, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
A couple of points about that: 1) Do we have any reason to believe he will heed a topic ban any better than he listened to those who have advised him regarding RfA? 2) He has made no edits in mainspace since May.
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 22:57, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
I was thinking there might be some way to actually block him from the topic. Is that not technically possible? --MelanieN (talk) 23:09, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
That is not, if discussion fails, its block from the whole project, or not. Monty845 23:11, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
That is possible via an
edit filter. It's bad for performance in the long run, but I routinely use my personal filter for short-term blocks on specific user-page combinations. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣
♠ 00:13, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
The interests of Wikipedia come first. WP:Wikipedia is not therapy. Xxanthippe (talk) 21:34, 30 November 2012 (UTC).
Yes, but how much is this really harming Wikipedia?
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 21:38, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
A couple of points: 'humouring' anyone with a health or social disadvantage is a misplaced suggestion - it's tantamount to the same kind of bulling that disadvantaged kids get at school. Secondly, this editor is very young and only exceptionally do users of this age probably make truly worthwhile edits (I know, I know, some of you will cry for stats and diffs, but let's keep this thread down to a minimum). Thirdly, his mum is (apparently) keeping a watchful eye and I would just tend to snow close any transclusions immediately and without fuss and with just a friendly message; plenty of us have RfA on our watchlists and that's what I'll do if I catch another one on-the-fly. Finally, I don't see or expect any serious damage or disruption so there's no need to be cruel to be kind, hence any suggestions of blocking or banning are probably OTT here. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:05, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
I agree with that. Just take down his RfAs (even if there are multiple such), and otherwise leave him alone unless he does something against guidelines. --MelanieN (talk) 01:45, 1 December 2012 (UTC)

For the record - [2]. -- KTC (talk) 03:11, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I've indefblocked per

WP:CIR. The revert warring over the transclusion of his malformed RFA was the last straw, plus issues in other areas don't exactly help either. --Rschen7754
03:19, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I have reminded Rschen7754 of the requirements of
talk
) 03:36, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
I'm sorry, what? Why do you think this block was inappropriate? --Rschen7754 03:41, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
Block is appropriate in the circumstances. Xxanthippe (talk) 05:02, 2 December 2012 (UTC).
I have not suggested that the block was inappropriate, and I don't know where Rschen7754 got that idea from. --
talk
) 15:57, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Sounds familiar

Not that this is exclusive to any one person, but the above message from his mother joggled my memory of a similar situation. And I seem to recall that CameronPG would sock, and use IP addresses to edit etc.

These could be wholly different people, but it just sounded too familiar to not at least note it. - jc37 01:02, 1 December 2012 (UTC)

A smart bit of detective work. Some people may be having the wool pulled over their eyes. Since identity is so easily disguised on Wikipedia, the best policy to follow is to apply Wikipedia's rules dispassionately without regard to persons. Xxanthippe (talk) 01:48, 1 December 2012 (UTC).
To be frank, I was suspicious of that message from the "mother" as soon as I read it. I'm not at all convinced it's genuine. I don't think this situation with Cmach7 requires any special treatment; if he continues to file RfAs then I think a CIR block may be called for.
berate
18:31, 1 December 2012 (UTC)

This is good...

Well, now we're seeing a change. RfA activity is picking up while the activity on this page is in a lull (this post is the first edit on this page in over two days). Maybe Kim's discussion about shutting RfA/RfB down has woken a few people up. However, it won't really help if this is just a temporary thing that dies off after the current RfA are over. We'll need to keep the pace up if we want RfA to actually stay revived (and it would be fun, just for fun, to see an admin try an RfB (why not you, Scotty?)). It's looking good at the present, let's keep it up.

AutomaticStrikeout
02:48, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Maybe. But my experience is that these things come and go in waves. - jc37 03:26, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Perhaps. But we've definitely been on the decline. The statistics make that quite clear.
AutomaticStrikeout
03:28, 17 November 2012 (UTC) P.S. JC, Why don't you run for cratship?
Wikipedia:Requests for bureaucratship/Jc37 - Someone else also brought it up recently at Wikipedia:Editor review/jc37. I may again, but still thinking about it. In the meantime, I'd welcome your review : ) - jc37 20:43, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
I'm not a great reviewer, sorry. Personally, I feel that everyone should submit an RfA at some point just so that they know what the process is like. I think it would end up being a net benefit because people would remember how they felt about the treatment of them during their RfA and that might affect how they behaved at RfA.
AutomaticStrikeout
20:55, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
I've been through 2 RfAs and an RfB. And I don't necessarily disagree. That said, RfA is what it is. I've seen some where the request sailed through and some where the request was an utter trainwreck. There are a lot of reasons. And I don't think that we can generalise. - jc37 21:00, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, perhaps so. Still, I think someone should try an RfB. There has to be a valid candidate somewhere.
AutomaticStrikeout
21:29, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Also, is it really true that there were
AutomaticStrikeout
21:31, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Never mind. Looks like there were
AutomaticStrikeout
21:35, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

<*nod*> It's an old trick discovered by User:Radiant!. When a process like RFA is failing, when you threaten to shut it down, sometimes (counter-intuitively) it picks up.

This is only a temporary side effect. There is no guarantee the the underlying systemic problems have magically vanished somehow. :-P

--Kim Bruning (talk) 18:38, 18 November 2012 (UTC) That, and I feel that I'm a really unconvincing boogieman.

That's right. Every so often we hit an arbitrary benchmark, or some event happens that gets everyone here all worked up about the status of RfA, and then we have a brief flurry of RfAs in reaction. We still had an abysmal 1 promotion last month, and we'll have a few more than that this month, but nothing ever really changes. Swarm X 18:51, 18 November 2012 (UTC)
@AutomaticStrikeout: Who me? I haven't even been an admin for a year yet, and have very little interest in working at
WP:CHU. And even less interest in putting myself through RfA again. I seriously doubt I'd succeed even if I tried. ‑Scottywong| express _
19:19, 18 November 2012 (UTC)
I think I probably mentioned you because I've seen your name a lot, particularly on this page.
AutomaticStrikeout
01:33, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
Come on Scotty, you would pass RfA. You would get the usual crowd consisting of everyone you've ever blocked, but most everyone else would support you. This is why I like working SPIs, all my blocks are from indef'ed sockmasters who can't vote without being caught ;) I've always thought periodic reconfirmations of 50%+1 would be worthwhile, but I understand and respect the opposition to it. We do have to make contentious calls on a fairly regular basis. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © Join WER 19:40, 18 November 2012 (UTC)
For the most part I generally support people who do content-related work. Those who are willing to work with in SPIs and AIVs will certainly have to deal with a lot retaliation and critism. –BuickCenturyDriver 00:14, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
I think oftentimes, the problem is that the candidate is expected to have a lot of experience in a lot of areas. Frankly, I think as long as the candidate would be a good admin in the areas where they intend to participate, that is what really matters. Btw Buick, when are you going to run?
AutomaticStrikeout
01:33, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
I've eyed it several times, but I have had a few off months so I am probably going to get a few opposes (see my second try). However I am open to a nomination. –BuickCenturyDriver 04:05, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
I don't know. I have something else on-Wiki that I'm starting to heavily consider right now and I don't really know a whole lot about you. You could always ask someone from
AutomaticStrikeout
04:17, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

Nominating people is a good start, but there was a reason there weren't any noms. How to address the systemic issues? The 'current best move' I can think of might be to just talk to everyone who is not properly participating in the process and teach them to do it properly. I mean, what else should we do, not take action where people are clearly misunderstanding the process?

That said, apparently folks don't entirely agree on what the point of the process is. That might need to be nailed down first :-P --Kim Bruning (talk) 04:56, 20 November 2012 (UTC) It's those finicky little details like "what are we really trying to do here" that tend to trip you up the most O:-)

RFA is highly susceptible to groupthink, so I don't think you can convince people who misunderstand the process that anything is wrong. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 06:36, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
Well, yes, exactly. Wiki processes that have been running for a long time sometimes do fall afoul of groupthink. At that point, so far, we end up having to shut them down. Any solution other than shutdown may have to take the groupthink into account.
That said, a number of editors working together *can* counterbalance groupthink to an extent. Whether or not you can get a sufficient number of people together in this particular case is a different matter of course. --Kim Bruning (talk) 08:42, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Hmm. Sergecross73 looks set to get the mop in about a day's time. Basalisk looks to have a pretty reasonable chance for three days from now. And Bgwhite seems set to sail through by 6 days from now short of some kind of explosion. How long will this mysterious good mood last? —

(❝?!❞)
21:31, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I was noticing the positive swing too. Maybe I should try my second run now ? I'm kidding, but even if it's only temporary, we're experiencing a nice change right now.
AutomaticStrikeout
21:37, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Well, I guess this is what happens when things go in spurts. Just like that, we are merely hours away from being down to a single RfA. Hopefully, somebody will throw his or her hat in the ring before we hit zero again.

AutomaticStrikeout
02:29, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I told you it was a temporary side-effect! The systemic problems have not been addressed, so activity drops back to previous levels.--Kim Bruning (talk) 02:36, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
Maybe so, but it isn't over just yet.
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 06:04, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
I don't think it's imperative that there is always a running RfA at all times, nor is the lack of an RfA at a particular moment evidence of systemic problems. It's a glass half empty/full thing. You can look at the last spurt of a half dozen RfA's and rejoice, or you can look at the probably lack of an RfA for the next few weeks and complain. Would it have made you feel better if the last 6 RfA's were nice and evenly spaced out over 6 consecutive weeks? ‑Scottywong| talk _ 04:32, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
I think that reading the graphs in the section below would be somewhat enlightening. At the current net. rate, we are losing admins faster than we are replenishing them.
So, sooner or later, if we don't take measures, we will run out of admins.
  • Is this unrealistic? No, it's a statistical certainty.
  • Is it alarmist? Errr, not necessarily, it just means that Measures Should Be Taken (tm), Sooner Or Later (R).
  • Should we just sit here and do nothing? Only if you think there should be no admins.
I'm not sure how you can claim there are no systemic problems.
  • Old people leave from time to time, new people come in, but -due to "standards inflation" - the new people are held to the standards of the old people, not to reasonable new-people standards. So RFA slows and slows.
  • The above wouldn't be a problem, if the process was flexible and open to experimentation. (aka. subject to
    continuous improvement
    ). Right now, the process is totally stuck, and no-one can get it changed at all. The world keeps changing+ your process doesn't change=broken process. It's a classic systemic problem. Lack of continuous improvement will almost always land you in this same situation.
---Kim Bruning (talk) 17:42, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
It is the productivity of Admins. that is the true measure of whether there is a problem with lack of actual numbers. Simply looking at a decline in registered Admins. tells us little about whether we are running out of productive capacity. This doesn't require charts. It simply requires experienced, active admins to tell us if they are substantially busier than say, 4 years ago, in the areas in which they most frequently operate. Leaky Caldron 18:08, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
What makes you think that? --Kim Bruning (talk) 15:52, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Well, that's that effect taken care of. Come Dec 13 this looks like it'll be just as dead again. --Kim Bruning (talk) 14:41, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

We just promoted five admins. I don't think it's dead yet.
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 18:59, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
I know you did your best :-)
But look at the numbers: At a rate of 5 successful RFA's per quarter, we cannot maintain our admin numbers. Wikipedia-as-we-know-it will eventually run aground if we stay the current course. :-/
What nobody tried to do this last quarter (or even this last half year) is try to change course and reform the system.
All previous attempts at reform have been blocked.
I think the best solution here is to terminate this process, and fall back on the meta process for requests for permissions. Despite stewards/meta being far from perfect for this, we'd probably end up giving more people the buttons. With a little luck, it would be sufficient to stabilize our admin numbers.
--Kim Bruning (talk) 05:17, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
The meta process is "get local consensus and then ask at meta:RfP, if your wiki has no procedure of its own and no local bureaucrats". Even if you succeed in abolishing our local procedure without any replacement, we still have local bureaucrats. And you're still not getting away from the "get local consensus" part, which so far is where every other replace/reform RfA proposal has failed.
But on the subject of crazy ideas, maybe we should go back to that
Jimbo "no big deal" quote and just allow the 'crats to "iar-sop" people who should be admins. Except I'm sure most if not all of the 'crats wouldn't want to do that, and the controversy would probably never end if they did. Anomie⚔
13:42, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
Right, I expect deconstructing this particular broken system will take some work, before we can reconstruct anything useful. --Kim Bruning (talk) 23:11, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
  • Something must be done. This is something. Therefore we must do this!—S Marshall T/C 20:30, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
I love that quote! :-)
Prong 1: I do understand the dangers of just doing anything, so we need to be a tad conservative.
I think that whatever further course of action is to be taken, most successful courses of action will share the following 2 steps:
  1. Recognition that there is a problem. (to wit, RFA is no longer fit for purpose)
  2. Decommissioning of the problematic process. (List RFA under MFD specifically to enact an Esperanza-style solution)
So I think that doing those 2 steps in a short while is still a fairly safe move.
This also forces people into determining new courses of action.
Prong 2: Due to the fact that RFA is pretty much deadlocked, if we remove RFA, pretty much any follow-on course of action would likely lead to an improvement in our admin situation. So this is one of those rare times where Doing Something Random might actually work! (This is saying more about RFA than about taking random courses of action, normally :-P)
Kim Bruning (talk) 23:13, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
We aren't getting what we want at one venue, so we should go to another venue? Just out of curiosity, how is this not a form of
WP:FORUMSHOP? : ) - jc37
23:19, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
More like FORUMDEMOLISH. :-P The venue is no longer providing sufficient utility to the community. Due to current Kafkaesque snarl-ups, no one is allowed to maintain it at this point in time. Due to lack of maintenance, it has become ramshackle. It should therefore be condemned and demolished. --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:13, 12 December 2012 (UTC) It's more or less User:Radiant!-style reasoning. Maybe if we poke them they might show up and do a much better job of it? ;-)
So, what are you going to do?
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 00:26, 12 December 2012 (UTC)
RFA is currently in a state analogous to
WP:ESPERANZA near the end of its life. RFA has a large bureaucratic overhead, and no ability to adapt. My suggestion is therefore to follow procedures analogous to the dismantling of Esperanza. For some insights, see, eg. Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2007-01-02/Experanza . --Kim Bruning (talk
) 00:32, 12 December 2012 (UTC)
I'm having trouble following this conversation -- could someone in a sentence or two summarize what the problem is? Is it that this process is so cumbersome that we don't have enough sysops? And if so, is there any evidence for the claims that a) we don't have enough sysops and/or b) that the process is problematic such that candidates who ought to succeed are being blocked? Or is the issue something else entirely? PStrait (talk) 00:38, 12 December 2012 (UTC)
Some recent information showed no sysops created for one month a while back. There is a decline in both editors and admin, but not to levels that are a concern yet, but could be in the near future. A number of recent RFAs have become controversial over aggresive discussion that became uncivil and believed to be part of the decline with this process.--
talk
) 00:57, 12 December 2012 (UTC)
Every month, a number of people become inactive on Wikipedia for any number of reasons. Perhaps they're tired of Wikipedia, or maybe they just found something else to do. Some very few wikipedians might even have gotten the mythical "A Life" though personally, I have never experienced such a thing ;-)
This is all perfectly natural and happens in any organization. In and of itself it's no reason to panic.
Now: statistics say that some percentage of the people who become inactive were admins. This means that over time, we slowly lose admins.
This is not happening at a particularly alarming rate. It's just happening.
Once again, there's no particular reason to panic. As long as we replace admins as fast as or faster than they leave, there's no particular problem.
Unfortunately, at this point in time, RFA is pretty much effectively non-existent. It certainly doesn't make a dent in replacing the net outflow of admins (however slow that outflow might be).
So right now, there's nothing disastrously wrong yet, but month-by-month we inexorably move towards the point where we don't have enough admins.
It doesn't matter where we draw the line for "enough", because we'll eventually end up with 0 admins, should this trend continue. Most people will agree that 0 admins is perhaps a bit too few. ;-)
At this point in time, the solution can still be relatively simple. We have the (man/woman/bot/other)power to effect any change and see it through. If we modify our course now, we'll likely never run aground at all.
On the other hand, the longer we wait, the fewer admins and other community members we will have to effect a change. It also becomes harder for the admin group to absorb any temporary issues with changes to RFA.
So for these reasons, it's important to act before things become really urgent. It's a bit like global warming. If we act on time, nothing really bad will happen. However, convincing people to act on time is rather tricky.
See also: Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship/Archive_220#New_chart
--Kim Bruning (talk) 01:00, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

Adminship and an outstanding topic ban?

If an editor is made the subject of a topic ban, after persistent disruption to a narrow field, does this rule them out either automatically, or almost certainly, from running at RfA? Andy Dingley (talk) 00:34, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

It depends on the topic ban, why it was applied, how long ago it was applied, and whether the editor has complied with the topic ban. --Rschen7754 00:36, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
OK, so it's evidence that would influence judgements (pretty obviously), but it's not necessarily or of itself a bar to achieving adminship. Andy Dingley (talk) 00:38, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
There are no 'bars' to achieving adminship. Each application is treated on its own merits by the community and the final outcome depends very much on who turns out to vote. Voters do not practice the same criteria. That said, some users may possibly be hesitant to support a candidate who has had a topic ban within the previous 12 months. No bans are issued without a good reason. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:48, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
Given the history of RFA its extremely unlikely that any editor under a topic ban or restriction would ever be selected even if there are no rules against it. Even if the ban were lifted prior, significant time (at least 6 months and probably more) would be required before they could overcome it and even then its likely a lot of the editors would bring it up.
talk
) 01:02, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
I have to agree with Kumioko, success would not be likely. I'm not saying such an editor shouldn't try, but they shouldn't expect to pass.
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 01:09, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
For me, whether the ban was still in force wouldn't matter, instead the question would be why where they banned, and how long ago was it. I'm more suspicious of an editor who requests the removal of a topic ban then I am of an editor who accepts the wisdom of the community and stays out of trouble while editing elsewhere. Monty845 23:55, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
"They shouldn't expect to pass" is far too weak. They should expect to fail. There's an off chance they won't, but .... WilyD 17:33, 4 December 2012 (UTC)
That was the nice way of saying it. There is no way whatsoever that someone under a topic ban would pass.
AutomaticStrikeout (T • C
) 18:02, 4 December 2012 (UTC)
And now we're arguing semantics? Aye yai yai... Kurtis (talk) 00:23, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
We're discussing whether it's more civil to give someone a bit of hope that they'll pass an RFA, or to try and prepare them from the inevitable letdown of failing. I may now be arguing semantics ... WilyD 11:17, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
Indeed. =P Kurtis (talk) 02:07, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

Side note: If the editor is under a topic ban, or an interaction ban for that matter, the ban applies to the editor, so it obviously includes any additional tools and responsibilities they may have or later pick up. This of course includes adminship.

So following that, if the community did decide to entrust the editor with adminship, the topic ban would of course apply to usage of the tools, and performance of admin-related responsibilities. - jc37 01:45, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

There was a similar discussion to this a few weeks ago: see Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 219#Conditional/qualified RfA acceptance. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 23:50, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

  • On that discussion, the topic of is it "possible to confirm an editor for adminship with restrictions on how or where he or she could operate" the answer is a clear no. That was covered in my RfA, with some opposing solely for CSD reasons. I agreed to stay away for a few months and get mentoring, but it was unenforceable. Some trusted my word, some did not. I fulfilled my pledge fully[3] and now have the dubious distinction of being the only admin I know who was supported based on an unenforceable promise of seeking mentoring. I thought it was unnecessary and based on incorrect metrics, but a promise is a promise. I still tread lightly there. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © Join WER 22:13, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
  • I'm with Rschen7754 on this, it depends on how stale the cause of the ban is. If the ban is less than 6 months old then I predict snow fail regardless of how well you've complied with the ban. But if an editor who was topic banned from a particular topic two years ago was to run for RFA having complied with that topic ban for two years of active editing then I would be surprised if the community would demur. Of course if during the RFA people discovered that they hadn't fully complied with the topic ban then things could go very pear shaped very quickly. But if an editor said they were complying with a topic ban and intended to continue to do so as an admin then I doubt many would oppose after that long a gap, and if anyone would oppose after such a long gap it does prompt the question How long would it take in such a scenario before you could support?. ϢereSpielChequers 23:23, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
And if the person hadn't come forth with the issue on his/her own. The community is often forgiving of people if they confess their sins; but if there is any inkling that the candidate was hiding it, to quote the Queen of Hearts, "off with their head."38.100.76.228 (talk) 21:26, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
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