Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2006

message: I don't think this will scale too well and there is still the problem that votes are visible.Geni 01:32, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: While I agree there are some possible issues with public voting, I didn't see them as a problem in any way in the 2006 election.  I'm not opposed to keeping public voting for the next election.  Ral315 (talk) 08:53, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: This year's (RFA based)

message: Can we please hurry up and decide whether to use Special:Boardvote or not? If Jimbo has objections, can he please post them here? If we need election officials, can we recruit some here? My current thought is that if we use the RFA system I shall boycott the elections and petition others to do likewise. [ælfəks] 05:29, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: discussion was started in march.Geni 20:10, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have zero confidence in any election process that makes individual votes visible. While it may seem open, the process of open ballot elections permits a level of bullying, favoritism, fear of retaliation, and groupthink that defeat the purpose of a free election. If Special:Boardvote is good enough for board elections, it should be good enough for ArbCom elections also. For these reasons, it's doubtful that I'll be participating in this election. - Stephanie Daugherty (Triona) - Talk - Comment - 08:20, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I've also made my concerns about this election known on foundation-l:   - Stephanie Daugherty (Triona) - Talk - Comment - 09:01, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Decision needed

message: :3 months and 150 edits last time. I suggest bringing the edit count down to 100.Geni 17:36, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I suggest raising it to 3 months and 300 edits. Vandalfighting animated tools now make it easier to rack up a lot of edits without getting any experience... ++Lar: t/c 19:49, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not too concerned about that. I'm more interested in makeing it hard to use sleeper accounts for voteing manipulation.Geni 20:01, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sleeper accounts can use such tools too. [ælfəks] 05:56, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: perhaps but at least we got some useful work out of them in that case.Geni 14:24, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Back to one colon. How are edits counted?  I am a newish user (April) and have 200 edits, but only of about 30 - 40 pages. Am I eligible to vote? Jd2718 22:40, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Total edits. ST47Talk 22:47, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Suffrage for voters

message: How about this? Personally, I find the concept of self-nomination both highly distasteful, and leads to, as Geni says, an excess of problems with people putting their names forward without a "snowball's chance in hell", as it were. Just an idea. James F. (talk) 15:00, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I like TenofAllTrades' idea up there. — Ilyanep (Talk) 21:28, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The TenofAllTrades approach is not bad at all, but adds a lot of process, doesn't it? This may be somewhat less process but still have a filtering effect. (but you have to put sufferage SOMEWHERE or new user A just gets nominated by new user B and we're back to the same situation except we had more process to get there)... ++Lar: t/c 19:46, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: TenofAllTrades' idea is very time, process and rescource heavy. I've never been happy about the idea of nominations. In any case most of the snowball candiates were very new. Even a fairly low entry requirement should be enough to make sure that the people running have a reasonable idea of their chances.Geni 20:16, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Right. The simpler the procedures are kept, the better. Let anybody who feels like running run, no need for nominations, etc. In several days after the voting starts half of the candidates will drop or get very bad percentages (support divided by total). After that, one may start thinking seriously on whom to support from the top 10-20 candidates. Least effort this way. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 02:07, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: are you volenteering to set up a 100 odd voteing pages?Geni 13:29, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: He has bots. So do lots of other people. If candidates sign up with just their userIDs, running a bot to create whatever structure is needed (including fetching edit count info and time on wiki info and all the other good stuff... most of which you get with templates already anyway) is work, yes, but not THAT much work. Heck I could probably do it and I'm not actually very good with code. I expect someone will volunteer once the requirements are clear, we have time for that yet. So.. not a showstopper, IMHO ++Lar: t/c 14:28, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: But still - it's a lot of work for the voters to sort through all the candidates. I'd be fine with a minimum edit count of 1000 (or even 2000 or 3000). No-one with less than that has any realistic chance and will be spared humiliation. But requiring nominations is just extra work which is hard to oversee. Haukur 13:05, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't think it is a good idea to reduce the number of candidates just because Joe the voter will be overwhelmed. Besides, I don't think voters need to examine _all_ the candidates. Wikipedia's hive mind will quickly reduce the number of serious candidates to a handful. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 15:13, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think the number of candidates starting the process matters overmuch (although there is certainly no problem with giving them a realistic appraisal of chances of success, since nobody with under a few thousand edits is likely to get through), I think what needs to be done is to encourage people to withdraw once it is clear that they will not pass, and remove these from the main election page.  If we can make the main campaign page just a list of names and current tally (or names, brief statement and current tally) - i.e. keep the long lists of sigs in a <noinclude> - and as I say encourage people to drop out to keep numbers down, that should achieve all we need to achieve.  Anything else is vulnerable to end up as instruction creep. But I speak as one who does not consider the current process broken, just a bit unwieldy at times. Just zis Guy you know? 10:21, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

text: I also like TenofAllTrades' nomination idea, slightly altered. You submit your name, and once you get ten people who nominate you, we pull your name and add you to the official candidate list. This prevents the spectacle of some popular people receiving 100+ nominations, while also politely rejecting those who have no real support in the community. NoSeptember talk 16:08, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Rather buracratic and rescource intensive.Geni 10:41, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with Geni. Haukur 10:58, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Candidacy only through nomination

message: Can someone provide links to pages describing the positions, what they involve, and how long the terms are? Apologies if this is all already written in planning documents, but just not made public yet. Also, can someone clarify how current ArbCom cases are handled in the period of transfer when current members stand down and newly elected members take up their posts? Thanks. Carcharoth 10:27, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've added links to last years signpost series that should provide some info.Geni 12:09, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What the positions involve 

message: Do we want to increase the number of seats on the committee?  The committee isn't always at full strength and maybe we need to expand a little more.  I can't see any harm in adding another three seats, increasing the number up for election to 8. That would increase the committee to 17 and make it an odd number, a good idea in my mind for decision making committees. Hiding Talk 15:01, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: A little late to disscuss that one I feel.Geni 16:45, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The committee at full strength is 15 members (there is currently one vacancy that is one of the seats being filled in this election), so there is already an odd number of members (and in any event, it doesn't matter that much whether the number is even or odd, because it never happens that all the ArbCom members sit in any given case). Newyorkbrad 17:31, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, I missed the vacant seat when I counted up at the committee page.  I don't see that it's too late to discuss it since the page states "the number of seats that will be up for election is unknown but will probably be at least 5".  I'd say it's too late when voting starts. So, given the committee is rarely at full strength, is expansion in order? Hiding Talk 20:07, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's unknown because I don't know how many people will retire before their term is up. We expanded arbcom last year.Geni 20:17, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Expansion would also be something that current arbitrators might have views on. Is their workload too much? Would they welcome an expansion? If something like this was really needed, I think it would have been suggested before now. Carcharoth 13:54, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

text: I suspect it's all up to Jimbo.  Last year he increased the number of seats from 12 to 15 without any prior announcement or consultation.  I suspect 15 is near the maximum practical number, but if there are more highly supported candidates then there are seats, he could conceivable do it again. Thatcher131 18:17, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If there were further increases, they would be in multiples of three (one extra arbitrator per tranche). Fifteen could very well be near the upper practical limit for the current system where all active arbitrators hear every case. --bainer (talk) 09:21, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Tidbit of information at User_talk:Jimbo_Wales#Emeritus. Carcharoth 06:21, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The general opinion apears to be that it is irrelivant see here.Geni 19:49, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the link. That explains a lot for those of us who don't follow the mailing lists. Carcharoth 20:03, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Number of seats 

message: I'd like to recommend consideration of an entirely no-nomination and non-partisan, electioneering-free system. Such systems have advantages such as offering more choice to voters as well as avoiding self-aggrandizement, partisanship, etc. Of course, any individuals so chosen could decline, but I believe a no-nomination system presents a better solution and is more in line with the consensus-building (rather than individualistic) aims and methods of Wikipedia. I think contributors are intelligent enough to make informed choices by witnessing the behavior of fellow Wikipedians without needing to read speeches. Brettz9 08:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's already self-nomination (pure no-nomination would be impractical, since there are those who would possibly win yet have no desire for the job) and while technically non-partisan with the exception of candidate statements and questions, the true pain of partisanship comes from groups which tend to vote as a block, as innocently as "this person is my friend, so I'm going to vote for him" or as complex and sneaky as real-world politics infringing upon our elections. The largest obstacle to nonpartisan elections lies in between these two, where private campaigning amongst large groups of friends takes place in the vein of "If you vote for John's friend Charles in the ArbCom elections, our group will support your bid for Adminship when it comes up". None of that sort of thing will ever be visible in a diff, and is the most difficult type of vote-abuse to rout, as by the time it's discovered, the perpetrators are already entrenched in positions of trust. ~Kylu (u|t)  19:33, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  When picking your ArbCom representatives this December, vote Wikisocial Democrats! I call party leadership. Ral315 (talk) 16:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: We really don't need parties in Wikipedia (unless it's the kind with free food :D). --WikiSlasher 08:36, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

text:  Yes, your statement about the obstacle is I think correct, but I don't think that pure no-nomination is impractical since, as occurs in other such systems as exist in the real world, as I mentioned, "any individuals so chosen could decline". I really prefer to deal with non-self-promoters in the case of representatives (and feel I can trust them more since I chose them of my own accord in witness of their services); maybe if others agree to this, a statement could be put out as to its rationale; a referendum (vote count) could be put on whether to adapt the system. And if it is adopted, again, if those elected do not wish to shoulder the responsibility and honor bestowed on them, they can bow out after appointment, but  people's choices, I believe, should not be restrained ahead of time. Brettz9 13:47, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  No-nomination system 

message: Not to venture too far off topic, but I am reminded of the Tetragrammaton in Equilibrium.  Is Christian Bale up for election? If not, where did these names come from?  GChriss <always listening><c> 09:05, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Alpha, beta and gamma are the first three letters of the Greek alphabet (Α, Β, Γ), equivalent to A, B and C. Tetragrammaton refers to the Hebrew name of God, and is completely unrelated (it doesn't actually even contain the word 'gamma'). --Sam Blanning(talk) 13:15, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tranche Gamma? 

message: Will there be any guidance as to how many candidates an editor may support?  should support? It doesn't seem like there is likely going to be an enforceable maximum or minimum, but is there a number we should aim for?  or a number that makes good sense?  or, if that's too tough, a number that really doesn't make sense?  or are we on our own, guided by our best judgment? Jd2718 21:19, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Anyone who YOU would allow to make a decision over a policy you may have broken. As for a number, not none(useless vote), atleast 5(number of seats), not everyone(useless vote). ST47Talk 22:06, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: 'Not none' and 'not everyone' is obvious. I disagree with "at least 5". Less than five is perfectly OK. Carcharoth 00:58, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, as it will be support-oppose=total, then supporting or opposing everyone is actually not a useless vote, as a support/oppose vote has differing effects depending on how many oppose/support votes there are. Carcharoth 12:32, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Would it make more sense to support 5 or 6, my first choices to go on, or a broader group that I think would be reasonable, even if they go beyond my first chioces? Jd2718 02:24, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would say decide who you think would be best for ArbCom and vote for them, regardless of how many or few make the grade for you personally. I think the real issue is deciding when to vote. To be honest, I'm still confused about how exactly the voting works. Is it exactly like RfA, or are there differences? Carcharoth 02:30, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Support Guidance 

message: Well, apart from the question of whether Jayjg will run for re-election, I was wondering if there is likely to be a rush of last-minute candidates? What happened in the last elections in January? There are currently 31 candidates for this election, and there were 68 in the last election. Also, what happens in the period between the closing of nominations (1 December) and the opening of voting (4 December)? Carcharoth 12:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The edit-count qualification for candidates has kept the number down. Without checking, maybe 20+ candidates last time were hopelessly underqualified/inexperienced? So the number is not that far off. We have no way of knowning if there will be a late rush, a late trickle, or nothing, unless individuals tell us they will enter at the 11th hour. If I guessed a number, say 5 more (making 36), it would just be a guess. How could anyone know better? Jd2718 12:38, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

text: there were a number of last minute candidates last time it is not imposible that the same will happen this time. Between the 1st and the 4th a voteing page and voteing subpages will be set up.Geni 13:13, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Final count: 38 37. I knew one name that I thought would show up; hit never did. And then, in the 11th hour, another name that I have recently read so much about, appeared. This will be interesting. Jd2718 01:54, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The second one I can guess, but not the first one. Carcharoth 02:13, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: and for those worrying the voteing page has started to come together.Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2006/voteGeni 02:33, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks good. I tweaked the date. Do you have a procedure worked out to archive pages of candidates that withdraw mid-election? There are bound to be a few. Carcharoth 02:57, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: yup move to bottem of the page and use strikethrough on the vote links. Then protect their voteing page.Geni 03:09, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anyone expecting a rush of last-minute candidates? 

message: 36 candidates, as of 13:40 UTC. Still over 12 hours to go before nominations close. Three new candidates nominated themselves recently (2 today), but an earlier candidate withdrew. Carcharoth 13:44, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Final count: 38 37. I knew one name that I thought would show up; hit never did. And then, in the 11th hour, another name that I have recently read so much about, appeared. This will be interesting. Jd2718 01:54, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The second one I can guess, but not the first one. Carcharoth 02:13, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: and for those worrying the voteing page has started to come together.Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2006/voteGeni 02:33, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks good. I tweaked the date. Do you have a procedure worked out to archive pages of candidates that withdraw mid-election? There are bound to be a few. Carcharoth 02:57, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: yup move to bottem of the page and use strikethrough on the vote links. Then protect their voteing page.Geni 03:09, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Update

message: Pendantic and maybe slightly unnecessary, but I'm interested in a list of those candidates that nominated themselves and then withdrew. I guess I can get such a list by going through the history of the candidates statement page, but does anyone already have such a list? Carcharoth 18:42, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: no nor is there likely to be one.Geni 22:10, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I still went through the edit history and found some interesting withdrawn candidates - not all of them were unsuitable candidates, and some had interesting things to say. One I've found so far has an interesting questions page. See: Questions for QTJ. Carcharoth 11:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Thank you. Would it be possible to get a response to the other questions I asked above? Carcharoth 23:19, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Other than to say that it shouldn't be put on the voteing page (due to size issues) I haven't really formed a view on those questions.Geni 23:43, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Candidates that withdrew 

message: Just noting here that The Wikipedia Signpost has produced a comparison of candidates, including a few questions asked of all candidates, which can be found here.  Ral315 (talk) 05:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The Signpost series of articles for this year and last year are also transcluded to the project page attached to this talk page. Carcharoth 11:22, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Candidates 

message: Actions count more than nice statements, so I would like to see examples of how candidates handled tricky arbitration issues. To this end, I just added a column "Examples" to the Summary table - please help me populate it! I also encourage candidates themselves; and I think it's also fine to insert counterexamples. Thanks, — Sebastian (talk) 21:09, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've merged that column into the notes, for now. It takes up a lot of space and it only applies to one candidate at the moment. If information is added for more candidates, it could probably be given its own column. Tra (Talk) 00:16, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Our posts just crossed - I just wrote a note on Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2006/Summary table. (BTW, I have no idea why this got confused with instead of my text, an LDS Stub got inserted there. I'm experiencing some connection problems, maybe it has to do with that.) — Sebastian (talk) 00:22, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Examples exhibiting arbitration skills 

message: "Self-nominations were accepted up to 1 December 2006" - does this mean candidates can still be nominated by third parties, or is it completely closed now? If nothing else, this is relevant to a recent tense change on the main page. --Sam Blanning(talk) 12:56, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the wording was originally intended to reinforce that the nomination process was by self-nomination, not nomination by third parties. As you point out, the change in tense that came with the close of nominations made this unclear. I've changed the wording. --bainer (talk) 13:10, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Nominations by others

message: I must say I'm surprised there wasn't a rush of early votes like last time, and that mine was the first vote - but I digress. In the elections in January there was a bot that calculated the running totals every hour. Is there going to be the same thing this time? Fys. Ta fys aym. 00:09, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Mine might have been first, except I've been waiting for 6 minutes so I could see the proper format. Aww. -Amarkov blahedits 00:11, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Cryptic ran the main site used in last year's elections.  I've left him a message.  Ral315 (talk) 00:14, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: well still had the toolserver with the en databse back then. User:Tangobot is the cloest to a currently existing bot with the functions you want that I know of.Geni 00:28, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Wonderful!! That is a great way to track the elections, especially now these tables are sortable. You can see you has the most support and oppose votes, as well as sorting by percentage. Someone send this to the Signpost. I'll do that now. Should it also go on the official election page? Carcharoth 11:04, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Running totals? 

message: Can I just ask whether something can be put down somewhere about how status of the voters is being checked? Are there people dealing with this (more organised), or is it meant to be a collaborative community effort where everyone checks the votes (duplicates efforts). Carcharoth 11:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm now raising this here instead. Carcharoth 10:29, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Checking voters 

message: Is it not possible to move discussions that develop on the voting pages to the discussion pages of the vote pages, leaving a link behind showing that a discussion had started there? That would make the voting pages easier to read, and less, well, messy and argumentative. Carcharoth 11:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: all discussions should be moved to the talk page without leaveing a link behind.Geni 12:31, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discussions on voting pages 

message: He vanished from the list. I went to vote oppose on him and now he's gone. Question page is there, but no vote page. He's not in the withdrawn candidates. Anomo 14:32, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Go to Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2006/Candidate_statements#Withdraw:_Avraham Jd2718 14:37, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Avraham withdrew: , .  At the last elections a subpage for withdrawn candidates was maintained, although I don't think one has been this time. There is a section for withdrawn candidates on the voting page, for candidates who withdraw during the election, since it's useful to keep a record of candidacies that officially entered the voting phase. --bainer (talk) 14:45, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The history of the candidate statements page will tell you who entered and withdrew/got kicked out during the nomination phase of the election. I've made a start analysing this at User:Carcharoth/ArbCom_Elections (down the bottom of the page). As you can see, I've only got part of the way through the history. The most 'interesting' thing I found was that Kohrs (the MyWikiBiz guy) tried to run as a candidate. Carcharoth 15:41, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What happened to Avraham? 

message: In connection with WikiCast, would someone be interested in getting
'audio' statments from the candidates?
I know some candidtaes are standing in respect of certain issues,
statments on WikiCast would give them a chance to perhaps expand
on why they are standing...
ShakespeareFan00 20:13, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Personally, I wouldn't be interested in recording a statement, since I don't own a microphone and I don't see what it would add to what I've said in text form. --Sam Blanning(talk) 13:54, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikicast 

message: May I transclude or link User:DumbBOT/E here? It's a bot-generated summary of the current status of votes. Tizio 12:24, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There are two other bots already and this one seems to have the colors backwards ... :) Interesting that there are several though. ++Lar: t/c 12:34, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't you know, yet? The bots are taking over the world Wikipedia? Carcharoth 15:34, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

text: The logic is that the candidates below 50% are safe from entering the AC so the are colored green ;-) Which ones those two bots are? It would be useful to link at least one of them from here. Tizio 17:28, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: See Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2006#Running totals?. Carcharoth 18:04, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks. I presume there is no problem if I link one (or possibly all) these report pages from here and from the votes page. I wouldn't have lost 20 min of my life had I known them... Tizio 23:10, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I would oppose linking this from the vote page, though I don't mind doing so here.  My reasoning is that we shouldn't encourage voting based on percentages.  Ral315 (talk) 05:25, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  The vote counters are already linked from the main vote page. See Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2006/Vote. They are at the bottom of the box on the right. Carcharoth 16:05, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks like I'm really bad at looking for things recently. Thanks again. Tizio 16:10, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I didn't see them either - in fairness the box they're in is titled how to vote, which probably caused it to escape parsing.  Regards, Ben Aveling 06:28, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Current votes 

message: Three candidates have now withdrawn after less than two days. At first I was annoyed that I wouldn't get the chance to vote for or against them, but now I realise I can spend more time considering how to vote on the other candidates! :-) Carcharoth 22:15, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It is quite common for candidates to withdraw during the voting, particularly when they are getting lots of oppose votes during the first few days. Several withdrew during the January 2006 election for that reason. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:15, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

text: HAHAHAHAHA! That's classic! --WikiSlasher 08:07, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

text: And then there were 32. Carcharoth 10:28, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: ...31 Carcharoth 23:57, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

text: ...32 (one of the candidates re-entered the race). Carcharoth 00:31, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Withdrawn candidates - making it easier to vote! 

message: Please change all writing to past tense where necessary (e.g Voting ran for two weeks.) Thanks, --WikiSlasher 03:05, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The voting is closed and because the page is protected, not even grammar should be fixed becasue it is a historical record. Cbrown1023 22:39, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: please contact the protecting/closing user on his talk page to propose those changes. ;) Cbrown1023 22:41, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The page was protected by  but the protection was unrelated to the closure of votes (there had been recent vandalism). I disagree that this page should be considered a historical record - the election process has not finished yet since Jimbo still has to select the winning candidates. Tra (Talk) 23:02, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it's fine to update it to reflect the fact that voting is now over; whether the process is ongoing or whether this is merely a historical record, the voting still occurred in the past :) I see Sam Blanning has just made the edit now anyway. --bainer (talk) 00:50, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Voting closed 

message: The page is not a historical record as long as the elections are not over, i.e., new arbitrators are not appointed. As may be seen from the page, new appointments were expected to be announced on Monday. Today is Wednesday. Does anybody know what is the reason for procrastination and where the announcement will eventually be made? --Ghirla -трёп- 09:12, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Apparently the new terms begin at the end of the month, so there isn't a need for a rush. Incidentally, I wonder if Filiocht (elected in January but last real edit in December 2005 and currently away indefinitely) will be replaced. Fys. “Ta fys aym”. 09:36, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just to add a bit of drama and wile away the waiting time, here's a breakdown of absolute vs. relative support. I'd say competition for the fifth seat is still wide open...  ~ trialsanderrors 20:11, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting graph, I love this sort of thing.  I just want to point out a few things.  First of all, there is a high likelihood that at least six people will be appointed to the ArbComm, given the recent resignation of one arbitrator who was not up for re-election.  Also, in light of this post by Jimbo, I believe that if Jimbo decides to appoint from the top of the list (in percentage terms) down, and not skip anyone, the logical number to appoint would be seven.  (This would seem especially logical in light of the comment by Fys above, regarding an arbitrator who seems to be missing.)  There is a significant gap in percentage terms between #7 and #8, while #4 through #7 are bunched together and #6 and #7 were virtually tied (less than a half percentage-point apart.)  Personally I am hoping that this is exactly what Jimbo does -- of course, my opinion is somewhat influenced by who I voted for, but I also think it seems logical.  I also think that the logical ordering of the candidates is their percentage vote (the vertical axis on your graph) and not Support minus Oppose votes (the horizontal axis.)  Actually, the real issue here comes down to the fact that Can't Sleep, etc., received an unusual number of total votes (99 more than anyone else), resulting in him having the highest number of Support votes and coming in fourth in Support minus Oppose, but (coincidentally) being #8 in percentage terms.  I think it's just a question of how Jimbo chooses to deal with a situation that was probably unanticipated, but I don't see any logic to deciding in terms of raw votes.  The real issue probably would be whether Jimbo decides to appoint the top 7 or the top 8 -- or something else entirely.  6SJ7 21:05, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well there is a rationale for looking at #Support – #Oppose, and that's that there were possibly more than 1,000 voters (I'm eyeballing here), the majority of which "voted" neutral for all candidates (Can't Sleep got the most total votes, but still less than 500). So ((+1)* #Support + (0)* #Neutral + (–1)* #Oppose) / #Voters (which can be normalized to #Support – #Oppose) is just as reflective of community approval as #Support / (#Support + #Oppose). And it does away with the (admittedly hypothetical) case of a candidate getting 85.7% approval based on 6 Supports and 1 Oppose. Of course this is all complete wonkery. ~ trialsanderrors 21:32, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

text: It is also possible that there really will be an expansion. Didn't Jimbo warn that this was possible? There are smaller breaks in percentage further down. I could see more than 7. And it doesn't bother me. Without refering to individuals, I am delighted with the overall profile of those with the most support. If a question mark were to be included, it would not reduce the overall effect. These were good elections. Jd2718 05:04, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

text: See this comment from Jimbo . -Will Beback · † · 07:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jimbo appoints 

message: Overall the elections went smoothly. However, one thing I believe we should be stricter in next year is moving voter's comments to the talk page. It's probably best to move all such comments, but especially comments that are rather lengthy or contain diffs should be moved. The reason is that opposers tend to use these to cast the candidate in bad light by give a one-sided view of a situation he was involved in, in a manner that the candidate cannot really respond to on the voting page. Voters that feel the need to write a long story about the candidate tend to be people with an axe to grind, anyway. It would be easy to construct a bot to do the moving. >Radiant< 13:16, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Change for next year