Wikipedia talk:Adminship renewal

message: While I think this proposal is OK "in theory," (meaning: I think the idea of reviewing admin privileges is a good one) I worry about the additional administrative load (not just on bureaucrats, but on the community as a whole) from dealing with hundreds of adminship renewals each year.   Does anyone have an idea about ways to limit the negative impact of this? Nandesuka 13:22, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This would mean approximately 800 renewals a year, perhaps growing to a thousand or more. That's twenty a week. The burden isn't just on bureaucrats, but the whole community. I barely find the time to vote on a few RfArs a month. I'd hate to have to spend more time just maintaining the status quo. -Will Beback 05:19, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bureaucracy 

message: I believe a process similar to this, and perhaps actually this one, is a good idea. Even though I disagree with the way Ardenn has been using recent AfD's to make a point his underlying argument is valid. I have come across at least two current admins who have been borderline abusing their role. Not enough to take to Arbcom, but I suspect they would behave quite differently if they knew they would be held to account at the end of the year. Good systems tend towards openess and accountability. Currently Wikipedia is open, but lacks accountability. 
I need more time to think about this specific proposal, but I certainly support it in principle. Gwernol 13:27, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Support in principle 

message: Been suggested before the problems are:
*The numbers involved. We have 909 admins at the moment. that means 2.4 a day or 17.4 per week. that is a heck of a lot of votes.
** If there is sufficient interest, I think getting people to vote would not be a problem. Wikipedians are more than happy to endorse sysops in which they are satisifed with their actions. - Mailer Diablo 13:59, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: problems

message: Geni raises some excellent points. There are interesting (if imperfect) real-life parallels in countries like the USA where sheriffs are voted into office. Here are some ideas that may be worth considering:
* At renewal time, any user can comment, but only admins vote on renewal. The advantage is that all editors get to give input on an admin, but trolls and vandals can't overwhelm the process. However, this is counter to the way Wikipedia works now (at least in RfA) and could introduce valid concerns about cabals/cliques. A completely open renewal process could disuade admins from making the important, controversial decisions as Geni says.
* Automatically de-sysop admins after a year. Admins would be encourage to re-apply, and naturally their record would be taken into account. The advantage of this over renewal is it reduces the administrative burden as inactive admins wouldn't re-apply so the number of cases to review would be smaller.
* Only renew adminship once, after a year - essentially a probationary period. Alternatively renew on an elongating scale - the first renewal after 1 year, the second 2 years after that, the third 3 years later etc. This would mean early in your term as admin you get reviewed more often, but more established admins get longer terms.
* Intermediate levels of adminship. I've seen this discussed on RfAs and other places before. Have "junior" and "senior" janitors with different tool access. Over time people get "promoted" throughb the levels with review at each stage. This is another variant of the "probation". I've always viewed this as introducing unneccessary complexity - most editors don;t really grasp what an admin is (nor should they) let alone the notions of gradations between admins. But maybe this is the way to go?
More as I think about this, its an important topic and I hope we can get more experienced users and admins to comment on it and generate a real consensus. Gwernol 17:00, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  More ideas 

message: I've broadened the exception from Jimbo to any official representative of the Foundation; I see no concievable way that someone like Danny could have their adminship revoked without Foundation approval. Kirill Lokshin 19:43, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Exceptions 

message: Because this proposal pops up about once every (two) months or so. We've also had an experiment on Requests for Adminship which seriously Did Not Work. So erm, snowballed it.  Isn't there a perpetual proposals page you can go to look, to save yourself investing your time on things like this? Kim Bruning 06:38, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm fine with that. But the ideas behind this particular proposal were tested on RFA a couple of months ago. This proposal comes along every other month. Every other month after long debate, everyone agrees it's a bad idea. Perhaps it's wiser to spend that energy on a different idea? Kim Bruning 10:16, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

text: * Ideas evolve. They don't pop up like anything. Which is why even if this is rejected, the discussion as a result is still useful in the quest for greater admin accountability. - Mailer Diablo 18:26, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Saying the same thing over and over == evolution? Kim Bruning 18:35, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Personally,  I like the concept of 1 year and then retire. <innocent look> . The nice thing is, we don't even need to modify policy to implement this. <very innocent look> Kim Bruning 11:24, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: And if they refuse to retire, will the Sandmen come after them? ;-) Kirill Lokshin 11:39, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Ooooh, fun! How about Rick Deckard? :-) Kim Bruning 12:02, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Marked as rejected 

message: We're starting to get to the point where proposals are being rejected because, um, they are rejected.  Yes, this talk has happened before, and yes, I think that this idea wasn't the one I'm looking for, but we have to be careful about stopping talking/thinking/working on something just because we haven't gotten anywhere before.  Beware inertia! - brenneman{L}  09:34, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm fine with that. But the ideas behind this particular proposal were tested on RFA a couple of months ago. This proposal comes along every other month. Every other month after long debate, everyone agrees it's a bad idea. Perhaps it's wiser to spend that energy on a different idea? Kim Bruning 10:16, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

text: * Ideas evolve. They don't pop up like anything. Which is why even if this is rejected, the discussion as a result is still useful in the quest for greater admin accountability. - Mailer Diablo 18:26, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Saying the same thing over and over == evolution? Kim Bruning 18:35, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Personally,  I like the concept of 1 year and then retire. <innocent look> . The nice thing is, we don't even need to modify policy to implement this. <very innocent look> Kim Bruning 11:24, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: And if they refuse to retire, will the Sandmen come after them? ;-) Kirill Lokshin 11:39, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Ooooh, fun! How about Rick Deckard? :-) Kim Bruning 12:02, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Tail eating 

message: This may seem like a quibble, but I can't find anything in this proposal about term limits.  The process seems to concern itself with imposing terms of office.  I've seen many comments on project pages about term limits for admins, but is anyone actually proposing this somewhere?  Bovlb (talk) 18:37, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Changed. Bovlb (talk) 04:35, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Term limit versus term of office