Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 36

message: Wow, that's strange. I've always heard it's 3 months to become an admin, why are we capping people for time, and 6 months time at that! Ya know, even if they only were an admin for a month and ran off, we'd still get all that much help. Adminship should be given out liberally, Jimbo himself agrees with this, and I can't say I understand this new 6 month requirement used by some people. If we were to desysop everyone who made it at 3 months, we'd be minus about 250 admins (educated guess!), including myself. I'm not particularly annoyed at the bureaucrat opposition, but opposing people we all know will make great admins just because they haven't been here for such a long time, well, enrages me. Redwolf24 (talk) 23:32, 27 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I suppose you can vent your rage in placing your vote.  Time is important because it lets the community know that a person is not going to burn out or freak out; six months happens to be about the average maximum time that someone with, say, borderline personality disorder, can manage a positive relationship or interaction before breaking down.  It's not an unreasonable concern that someone will appear helpful, normal, and in general a good candidate for adminship (even being brand new to wikipedia) and then become horridly destructive soon after.  Clearly adminship is not a big deal, but it's a much bigger deal for such a meltdown (or desertion) to happen to an admin than just an editor, and I've seen far, far too many perfectly normal and helpful individuals experience just such a meltdown, particularly online. siafu 23:42, 27 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Both of the comments are correct. Time is important of course, however, there's no single policy covering the issue neither Rfa's have been consistent dealing with that. Plenty of admins became admins after only a few weeks since their first edit. Cheers -- Svest 23:53, 27 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Admins after a few weeks? Really? Do you know of any offhand? Carbonite | Talk 14:05, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I recall a few passing mentions of it happening in the eary days of the project.Geni 14:31, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, OK. I was just confused because the user who said that above has only been here since April 2005. He must be a much better Wiki-historian than I am. ;) Carbonite | Talk 14:52, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: You can, come to think of it, make a good case that a large proportion of people who eventually become admins are as capable after the first month as they are after the first year - the steepest part of the learning curve has been climbed, and the next few months are mostly incremental improvements to their knowledge and "familiarity" with the project (learning names and remembering links, as much as anything). I mean, Redwolf got adminship after not much more than a month of actual activity. Shimgray | talk | 14:55, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Yes but only becuase most admins take a while to "turn bad" and as a result were elected when standards were lower.Geni 14:34, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: No, because your caps lock key is stuck on. the wub  "?!" 00:02, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: (After edit conflict with Svest and Tedernist and the above IP) Are we so paranoid about this? For every one user who does this, there's 100 who don't. We have 6 admins forcibly desysopped (Stevertigo is the 7th), and something like 640 admins total. Plus why even stop at 6 months? Why not make it two years. I'm sure all the best admins have been here at least two years... But sysop abuse is rare, and most of the people respected enough to be nominated for RfA (in a non-trolling way...) will ask when they're not sure about something, otherwise they would have left a long time before three months ;-) I'm gonna cut myself off there before I rant... Redwolf24 (talk) 00:00, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: IS THAT A NO? IT'S NOT MY FAULT I CAN'T TURN OFF MY CAPS LOCK KEY IT WAS JUST ALWAYS LIKE THAT, IS THAT A PROBLEM?--205.188.116.132 00:04, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: It is impossible for anonymous IPs to become admins. The MediaWiki software does not support it. So why are you even asking? — JIP | Talk 07:59, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I totally agree with you Red and Wub. It should not be a big deal and of course why not 7 months or 87? -- Svest 00:13, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: 87 months is out as a criterion becuase Wikipedia only started 57 months ago. :D TenOfAllTrades(talk) 05:18, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It was meant to say that x or y months are not relevant when it comes to adminship! Svest 10:51, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: And Carbonite I'm glad you added in there are exceptions. I am alright with you having time problems, but if someone just goes around opposing on such grounds without looking at true merits or allowing exceptions, I will not get along with them. Redwolf24 (talk) 08:09, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Wikipedia gets funnier and funnier.  I know of a new sysop who doesn't know the difference between an attention and a cleanup tag. Just 5 months down in Wikipedia, he's been nominated and became a new admin, apparently because he hasn't offended anyone yet. Mandel 20:35, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I imagine that one thing we expect of admins is that, presented with a situation with which they are unfamiliar, they will ask a more experienced editor for guidance (or find it themselves on the appropriate project page).  BD2412 talk 06:43, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Wikipedia will continue to become more and more complex. It is not reasonable to expect that any administrator candidate understand all aspects of Wikipedia prior to becoming an administrator. Analogy; the United States holds the record as the country with the most laws. It is literally impossible for any one human to know all the laws in the United States, much less practice as a lawyer with respect to all of those laws. The human brain can hold 1013 bits of information; that's less than the sum body of law in the U.S. Yet, we don't regard lawyers as incompetent because they don't know all of the law. As Bo noted, what is more important is an administrator's ability to find guidance on issues they are not fully versed. --Durin 15:49, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: 3 Months-->6 months

message: I looked at the list of current admins for the second or third time today and had a thought: given a sufficient period of total inactivity, should admin powers be removed? Not as a punitive thing, of course. Simply because after, say, a year or 18 months, policy and procedures may have changed and if a person did come back they'd actually be unfamiliar with a number of things. Think, for instance, of image copyright tags. Marskell 13:02, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: No sir, I can point to no such thing—it just seems a perfectly logical bit of housekeeping a project of this sort should undertake. From meta: "Any sysop inactive on meta for a full year will be desysoped. "Inactive" means no edits in the past 6 months and less than 50 edits in the last year. They may re-apply through the regular way." Seems sensible. Marskell 13:27, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yet another rule that every admin is expected to be aware of...Lets spare the rule-making for the cases where it has actually been demonstrated necessary. — David Remahl 13:45, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: No, every bureaucrat. It'd be a simple enough chore really. Marskell 15:03, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Inactive admins 

message: OK, this turned out as badly as I feared it might.  Cognitions's RFA was pulled, apparently due to personal attacks.  He was told that it could run its course only if it didn't have personal attacks.  He removed the personal attacks, re-listed his RFA, and it was de-listed again.  I think he considers himself kind of a "reform candidate" in the RFA, so suppressing his ability to even participate is not a wise move, in my opinion.  "There is no cabal", but we've just given this guy good reason to believe there is.  Friday (talk) 17:27, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I didn't really get the chance to thoroughly go through the entire RfA, but how was it not violating WP:POINT? Even if it was in good faith, since it clearly wasn't going anywhere, yet trying to disrupt WP, how does it not violate said rule? Thanks. --Lord Voldemort (Dark Mark) 17:54, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: FWIW, in the above case, several other editors also considered the RFA to be a WP:POINT. It may come down to different standards of "disruption".  For an analogy, I've listed a couple things on Afd that ended up as a resounding "keep".  This may mean my judgement was wrong in those cases, but was I "disrupting Wikipedia to make a point"?  IMO, no, I was using an accepted process to argue what I believed was best.  Most other people didn't agree, but this doesn't make it a disruption, it just means my POV was an unpopular one.   Friday (talk) 18:02, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cognition's RFA 

message: I have made Steverigo's RFA into a link rather than a transcluded sub page. Steve's nom makes the page size extremely large. Those interested in following up on RFA nom, may the follow the link. =Nichalp «Talk»= 18:50, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stevertigo 

message: Should we have a policy that a person with less than 100 edits may not vote on RFA? This is to discourage sockpuppetry. =Nichalp «Talk»= 18:52, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: We have this rule on AFD and various other "votes", we should do here too. Make it 50 rather than 100 and you've got yourself a deal. Martin 18:55, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think adding a strict policy to that effect really does much more to discourage sock-voting. I mean, realistically such clear sockpuppets already don't get counted even on RFA, but people still attempt them. --Aquillion 18:56, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Its easy to rake up 50 edits in two days. PS I meant minimum "edits" =Nichalp «Talk»= 18:58, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Which rule do we have on AfD? The only thing I could find is "suspiciously new users may be discounted by the closing admin" on Wikipedia:Guide to deletion#Deletion process. Since I close AfDs myself, I'd like to hear about customs that I'm unaware of. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 21:00, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I'd prefer a mixture of duration and edits. Both low, but enough to discourage sockpuppets. Perhaps two weeks (from the date of the first edit) and 50 edits? At the very least, it would prevent sockpuppets from being created with the intention of disrupting a specific RfA (since they only run for 7 days). Carbonite | Talk 19:02, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, that's a good idea.  =Nichalp «Talk»= 19:17, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Alas! I suspect that a few sockpuppets feed at least 2 kids (accounts) for a relatively long time. The suggestion would help fight newly created SP's (just hours/days before voting) but will never help stop other live SP's from voting. Same applies to AFD's. -- Svest 19:23, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Very true, but there really isn't a way of stopping determined sockpuppets without alienating newbies. I think's it's best to work on eliminating the more obvious ones. You know, the user created yesterday whose second edit was vote on an RfA. Carbonite | Talk 19:45, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Absolutely, I agree. A day of harvest is better than 10 of droughts ;) -- Svest 19:50, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I kinda like Ann's idea, both limits are low enough to allow most users but high enough to discourage some sockpuppets. Also, it is important to point out that if somebody creates 2 or 3 socks and keeps them live for a long time, there is really nothing we can do. Sebastian Kessel Talk 20:36, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: See Wikipedia:Suffrage#Formal_suffrage. Martin 21:38, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: ...which makes very clear that there is no 'usual' threshold for participation in AfDs. -Splashtalk 22:50, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: ...and that there is a precedent for this type of thing. Martin 23:23, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Tempest in a tea-cup. In my looking at it, I can't think of a single RfA which has been borderline to the point that putative sockpuppets make the difference. The fundamental difference between a bureaucrat and an admin is closing RfAs. I assume they do their homework and surely if they do there is no issue; we don't need to say didactically "don't count votes from usernames started after the nomination." I'm premusing they don't do that anyway. Marskell 22:59, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Minimum edits to vote? 

message: There has been a proposal for a while to allow editors to request rollback privileges, as a step 'in between' admins and regular users. The discussion has died down but it seems that most people consider it a good idea. The main issue is that no interface exists for enabling rollback privs, so we must either ask a database user to enable the prevs, or ask a dev to create such an interface. So what would be the best course of action,
#Open up requests for rollback (either here or at WP:RFR) and ask a database user to grant them;
#Post a feature request and not do anything until it's implemented
#Consider the proposal impractical and forget about it
:Radiant_>|< 23:45, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Two looks like the best course of action to me, although I do think there is a rollback user status coded, I remember it was enabled at one time, but it is currently disabled. Once we know we can technically make users rollback only, then we should start with RFRs (which I fully support). -Greg Asche (talk) 23:48, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Since we are fairly liberally creating admins - is there a great need for this? Is it not just annother set of polls to distract us from article work into process? Are there many people we'd trust with rollback but not with other tools? And would rollback be awarded significanly earlier than adminship? Would the few extra roll-backers make much difference? It seems to me most obvious vandalism is reverted pretty quickly. In any case some non-admins have rollback already (I think monobook alterations can give it). I suspect folk want rollback - as without it admins beat them to revert - well, so what, as long as it is reverted?  --Doc (?) 23:59, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Actually, there is a way to do allow rollback to non-admins via javascript. Because of it's potential use for vandalism, I won't describe it or say much more than that it exists here, but there is a way. All it requires is for a proven vandalfighter to ask someone who knows about it (i.e., me) and after a quick check to prove they are legit, it can be applied. Plenty of non-admins have it, and quite a few admins know about it; I would suggest activating RfRoll as a place for users to note themselves, and a trusted admin (as it takes an admin to edit someone else's monobook.js) could check the user and grant the code. -- Essjay  ·   Talk 14:31, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I find Essjay's idea interesting as it would lead to an informal process. However, my only concern about creating a class of rollbackers whose hierarchy would be between the editors and admins is that it would complicate things on RFA for people who may not be interested in rolling back but interested in other admin tasks. Personally, I may just need the rollback tool but I'd still go for an RFA as additional abilities in the hands of a trusted wikipedian definitely wouldn't hurt. --Gurubrahma 14:46, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I just want to make sure I was clear; the rollback function currently available to non-admins is a javascript application, so it doesn't actually extend any extra priveledges, it simply automates the revert process. Rollback is not a permission, like deletion or page protection, but an automation of an existing function; for example, anyone can have a rollback button that works, because anyone may edit a page, however, a non-admin could not program a working blocktab via java, as they do not have the permissions necessary to access the block function. Therefore, it isn't actually creating a new level of users, it is simply allowing users who have demonstrated that they are not vandals to automate the existing revert process. -- Essjay  ·   Talk 14:54, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I've moved the talk to Wikipedia talk:Requests for rollback privileges where it belongs as per Dan's uggestion. Let us continue there. Thanks, Dan. --Gurubrahma 09:12, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Requests for rollback privileges]] 

message: I think there is a flaw on what RfA stands for. Or I am confused. Comments on RfA pages should have the intention to make a candidate a better editor is it not? After all adminship is no big deal. Any oppose should have a good reason such as "candidate not ready", "candidate needs to develop skill B" etc. Unprofessional comments such as "candidate sucks in general", "I will leave wikipedia if this person becomes an admin" etc. should be evaded in my view. --Cool Cat Talk 22:43, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. How is a candidate supposed to know what to do before they run again otherwise? --Celestianpower háblame 22:59, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree as well.  The comments I received for my self-nom were really fantastic, even though the votes were unanimous "no".  I don't necessarily agree, but then, that's the point, isn't it?  The community has spoken and I get to take the comments to heart and keep working on making the place better, and then come back in the future for another try.  Excellent.  Tedernst 23:16, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: What is RfA and what it is not