Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 51

message: I think it would blow the foam off the mystique of adminship (and thereby reduce the vitriol that occasionally arises in adminship debates) if we change the name of the position from "Administrator" to "Janitor". bd2412 T 18:32, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: How many janitors do you know that carry shotguns? ;-) Kirill Lokshin 18:34, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text: *Or dynamite for that matter. :) --Durin 18:40, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text: (Checks to see if the shortcut WP:RFJ is free...) --Deathphoenix ʕ 18:48, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text: *It comes with a price ;) --Durin 18:55, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text: If we do that, can we rename bureaucrats to Janitor's Closets? Cause we're providing mops :P — Ilyanep (Talk) 21:02, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Bureaucrats are the janitors of the janitors! :-) bd2412 T 21:10, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Excellent idea.  Then we can move all the sex out of #wikipedia and put it there.  Sam Korn (smoddy) 21:13, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Seconded. Why induce even more confusion? --maru   (talk)  contribs 02:43, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think we can find a better name, something not as clearly identified with a real world occupation. Like "muckers" or "slimers" or "grimers" or "scummers" or "scrubbers". NoSeptember talk 09:26, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: What about "moperator"? —Doug Bell talk•contrib 09:40, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: How about we call ourselves the Plumbers? --maru   (talk)  contribs 02:43, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Oh yes! :) I'm level 2.5. -ZeroTalk 17:41, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Hmm...I dunno if 'crats should be above ArbCom. — Ilyanep (Talk) 22:38, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Better make you sure you don't get hit by a nasty undead, could bring you back down (or would you prefer a Nintendo rather than a D&D reference?). JoshuaZ 22:42, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Makes it sound like Arbcom is a necessary step in a chain of promotion, but it's just a committee - one can become a 'crat with no Arbcom involvement, and vice versa. bd2412 T 22:44, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Based on your comment, a sysop is a "user with the regulator removed." NoSeptember talk 18:51, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Quite so. How about runamuck? -- Cecropia 18:58, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm all for "wild cannon". Kelly Martin (talk) 22:19, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

text: *Rubbish remover...   --Durin 16:08, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: *Kings and Queens of Blockville. Lord Bob 16:22, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: *"Clean" (reader) "virgin user" (anon editor), "casual user" (account holder), "junkie" (admin), "pusher" (bureaucrat).-gadfium 05:59, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: *Ooh, ooh, progressive ranking! Shit disturber (vandal, etc.), shit smeller (reader), shit stomper (casual editor), shit shoveller (editor), shit cleaner (euphamism for "sanitation engineer", ie, admin), gives a shit (bureaucrat), gives and takes shit (steward), makes the shit (developer), King of Shit (Jimbo).
*Custodian: 1) a person who has responsibility for or looks after something, such as a museum, financial assets, or a culture or tradition 2) a person employed to clean and maintain a building. That's always seemed like the best term to me. It actually describes what's done. We're not actually administrators at all. I think it's better than janitor though, because, while they are both more accurate than administrator, custodian communicates the importance of wikipedia in a way that, I think, "janitor" detracts from. - cohesiont 07:25, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

text: *Support. Very apt term. See also Custodian. --Ligulem 08:28, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Like it. bd2412 T 01:16, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Nice, I do too... -Mysekurity [m!] 01:21, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Bah. I remember in my grade schools it was the custodian that mopped up the vomit. :P — TheKMantalk 02:28, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sometimes admins here get to "mop up vomit" ;) - cohesion 20:00, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lets just call it a Janitorship 

message: I'm concerned about the inflation in acceptable edit summary percentages. I therefore tentively suggest having math bot only display an exact percentage if it is under 75% and otherwsie just say that it is over 75% (possible some other percentage). JoshuaZ 16:50, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the whole thing is crap ( no offense to the operator of Mathbot ) . Look at their last 100 contributions yourself. I can't believe we have such high standards for adminship. Soon enough only 3 people will be admins. — Ilyanep (Talk) 20:02, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I will take offence however, as I think that is a poor way of making a point, especially coming from a bureaucrat. But to answer the broader question, I perfectly agree that one should not be too reliant on statistics on any kind. They have a place; it is not as if quality and quantity have nothing in common, but one should keep things in balance. Luckily, most Wikipedians understand that, and for those who don't, they may make silly votes whether they use statistics or other arguments for it. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 22:37, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text: (ec) Why? An exact number lets people judge for themselves, and to make a qualified opinion of the person after looking at the candidate holistically. Having Mathbot report a range implies that 75% is an "acceptable" percentage of edit summaries, when in fact, there is no widely-accepted standard and can vary from person to person. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 20:07, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks! for the emphatic Thanks! ;-) --LV (Dark Mark) 20:16, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree. I prefer having as much info as possible, especially since the days when we knew the editing style of everyone wishing to be an admin are long gone. Put the info out there and let people make up their own minds.--Alabamaboy 20:15, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I'm very happy that I got my adminship while one was still judged on one's qualitative merits rather than quantitative ones. Sam Korn (smoddy) 20:19, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Same here. I've been here way too long :P — Ilyanep (Talk) 22:04, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  The entire procedure at this point is ridiculous. I made a rough estimate of the inflation rate of max at time t of cited minimum edit count, and it looks like it is going up by about 100 a month (my data may be innacurate, many sampling, other problems) at which rate a user who starts now and edits for eternity at a 100 edits a month will never be able to become an admin. JoshuaZ 20:30, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Whoo... I found that I edit at about 100 per 3 days to a week when I'm really active (like this week) but on average I apparantly have 5.73/day (which counts the few times i went on month-long vacations to internet-disabled places) which places me at 100 edits per 17 1/2 days (ish). I have no clue why I went through the trouble of finding that out, but I am not a very active person compared to the people with 5x10^2000 edits. — Ilyanep (Talk) 22:04, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I'm not sure what other people think, but I, for one, still base my vote on the candidate, not on statisitics. However, as I've pointed out many times before, numbers offer a more complete view of the candidate and allows voters to look at a holistic view. Statistics have always been part of analysis, and will inevitably be on RfA - for instance, if someone only has one edit, voters opposing on that basis (which will be practically everyone) are looking at a statistic. In a similar fashion, statistics can be a useful tool - or can be a destructive tool. It's up to the voters, but regardless of that fact, the statistics will still be "out there". Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 20:35, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Yep. I waited six months after becoming active before self-nomming myself on RfA simply out of fear of people's standards. Even then, I figured I might not make it because I had a comparatively low edit count, even for those times -- just barely over a thousand edits. Nowadays a guy like me would have no chance on RfA whatsoever -- far too often statistics are misused. IMO, if the user is not fit for adminship, you wouldn't need a statistic to oppose. Having said that, I recognise that statistics are just a necessary means for the community to function in selecting admins. I don't like it, but obviously other people do, so... Johnleemk | Talk 12:51, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Even though I've been working on Flcelloguy's Tool for a while now, and part of the tool analyzes edit summaries in depth, I personally don't even consider edit summary usage when looking at RfA candidates, per my RfA standards. There's no problem in having extra information, but there's a problem when users misuse it. Titoxd(?!? - help us) 21:30, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

text: The servers are based in Florida yes? So one doesn't have as much in direct bribery, but one has other options. These include finding the right person to have a very quick affair with, helping stuff ballot boxes, helping remove valid ballots, being a lobbyist and paying for the person to go to an excotic location for their "research" as to whether you should deserve an account. Also, just having a dinner or lunch meeting at a very expensive restaurant and paying for that. But no bribery, not in the US, they would never have bribery. Did I miss any other common behaviors that are definitely not bribery? JoshuaZ 02:12, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  :) what about the president NOT EVER meeting a particular disgraced lobbyist despite being photographed with him... definitely not bribery... Mikker (...) 09:40, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: *There's no reason why a candidate can't remove the graphs if they don't want them on the page since reverting mathbot isn't like reverting a regular user so there shouldn't be any issue with that but it's up to the candidate. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 20:35, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mathbot and edit summary percentages 

message: User:JoshuaZ mentioned above that he made a rough estimate that showed edit count standards at RfA are going up around 100 edits per month. There's a number of different ways in which we might determine the veracity of this assertion. One way is with the the chart I generated at right which shows the average edit count of successful RfAs and unsuccessful RfAs over time. It is interesting to note that there has been a considerable rise in the average edit counts of successful RfAs, but only a rather small rise in the same figure for unsuccessful RfAs. The approximate rise in edit count of successful candidates is about 171 edits per month. For unsuccessful, it's about 27. One possible conclusion of this is that it really isn't so much the standards that are going up as it is that the average successful candidate has a higher edit count, while the edit count rejection level has only slightly increased. Just some food for thought. --Durin 15:42, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Um. I think it is a little tricky to draw that line with confidence, really. For example, I could draw another line that goes down for the period Aug-05 - end Dec-05. -Splashtalk 15:55, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, but that would be arbitrarily restricting your sample size to 5 months ending 4 months ago, as opposed to 10 months ending now - less sound, no? I don't like Durin' possible conclusion, that standards are not shown here - since standards are published, you would have to assume that a decent number of potential admins do not apply, knowing that they fall short of those established standards. Stevage 16:10, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: The bigger issue is that it includes the obvious pass and fails. We need to focus on the close calls only to see where the real line is (although edit counts is obviously not the key issue in most close calls either). NoSeptember talk 16:00, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You know, the amount of data being generated about RfAs can be put together to write a paper or two. To me, those curves look suspiciously like fading channel measurements...Anyway, I think there might be a very easy way to fix those "close calls" - why not institutionalize as standard practise, bureaucrats leaving a message on the candidate's talk page, simply asking what sort of circumstances they want to be promoted under? Do they want to wait a little longer for a clearer margin for promotion? Or, would they be willing to settle for something with more ambiguity and controversy? There is no reason why the candidate should not have any input into the circumstances of how they were promoted. The fact is, some users will take into account and value the social context in which they are perceived to be promoted - and for the users who care about it, there will be an inclination to decline, and simply wait for another time. If the candidate declines, the bureaucrat could even say something like, in X months, I'll come back and nominate you. The system does not have to be "cruel" to these candidates - it just needs to be adjusted slightly so that the problem is less pronounced, and possibly even fixed. If the candidate does not decline in a marginal case, then they will have to work on Wikipedia with those consequences - in this case, the bureaucrat does not have to carry the entire burden of the decision. Yes, this situation can be open to be "gamed" - there might be a canvassing of votes. This will probably be solved with some modifications to this idea. Without going into too much WikiPolitics and WikiHistory, this seems to be the most clear and straightforward way to rectify a problem that has been brewing chronically. Refinements? Comments? What do you think? Obviously needs some tweaking, but I have not seen this idea proposed anywhere yet...I do hope it would be useful to make new ideas. --HappyCamper 16:15, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: All candidates are certainly capable and welcome to withdraw their nomination at any time, right up to the second it's closed by a bureaucrat. If they are promoted, they may certainly withdraw their adminship at any time as well. I don't think we need to add another step to this. --Durin 17:04, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  That second graph looks like a much more substantial trend. I'd be very interested in what happens when one looks at both edit count numbers and percentage success as long term trends and be very interested in what the R values are for all three of the best fit lines. JoshuaZ 19:03, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Actually, I think User:HappyCamper's suggestion there is a very intersting one. Perhaps all RfA's that fit into the 70-80% accept category could enter some second level of voting... Robdurbar 23:06, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  RfA edit  count standards going up? 

message: If people are interested, I created a page with the charts mentioned above and a few other charts relevant to RfA. The page is User:Durin/Admin charts. --Durin 19:54, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good work! Flcelloguy (A note?) 20:28, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Amazing. Many thanks.--Alabamaboy 20:33, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks. JoshuaZ 20:49, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  More graphs 

message: Any questions?  --Masssiveego 23:27, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Nope. I will say this though - those who want to find what they want to seek will always find it. So, could I request something of you? It's just a little thing. If you have an inclination to oppose candidates, could you please accompany your oppose votes with other material which, say, highlights the strengths of the candidate? Not only would it be more palatable for the recipient, it would also come across as more constructive. In this way, your votes would come across as more meaningful, and less polarizing. Would this be okay with you? Is this something you could work towards? How do you feel about this suggestion? --HappyCamper 23:49, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Unfortunately, highlighting strengths would probably support the canidate and cancel out the effect of the oppose.  Therefore I should
not give "compliments" about their strengths.  I think bad admin canidates should clearly know without confusion they are opposed. --Masssiveego 03:35, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Also, I recommend that you look back at RfAs you've opposed. Often, you may find some solid counterpoints that may negate your oppose. — Deckiller 23:53, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Why did this come up? Ëvilphoenix Burn! 00:25, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I just want to make sure that if he brings up a point, and someone provides a good counterpoint, perhaps he should change his position to be fair. — Deckiller 00:30, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Unless the counterpoint is clearly canceling out the reason why I opposed the canidate as wrong or false, I generally prefer not to change my position on my votes.  I have not seen anything that would change my vote at this time.  Otherwise if the counterpoint is merely, my voting record, or "I don't trust your judgement", I treat both as an insult that is covered WP:personal attack.  --Masssiveego 03:35, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, that makes very good sense. Thanks for the response. — Deckiller 03:37, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Since you ask, here's a question: Do you think any or all of the candidates you have opposed that were promoted have made bad admins? Would you be willing to rethink your strategy if you reviewed those admins that you opposed and found some of them proved worthy? Dmcdevit·t 03:40, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Since Wikipedia is not a democracy close votes without a reason carry much less weight when it comes down to it, and to a certain extent same with support votes with no reasoning but if your okay with the fact that your refusal (both Merecat and Massivego) to write anything else in addition to oppose on your input degrades the impact that your votes have to the process and the fact that they do nothing to convince people to vote oppose (quite the opposite in many cases since some editors will vote support just to spite oppose voters which is a fairly immature and unhelpful response) while giving people a reason why you think the candidate is not suitable as an admin can and many times will help people get a full picture and very likely even vote oppose as well due to concerns about the candidate. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 06:55, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Massiveego, please unless someone is for certain complaining about your voting on RFA or elsewhere, don't disrupt Wikipedia to make a point. Moe ε 17:45, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Actually there are many complaints about my voting, and this is the correct forum for dealing with these disputes/explainations.  WP:point
was overruled for voting purposes with Boothy443.  If there is a problem
with my voting habits, reasons, or otherwise about the admin election system.  This is the proper forum for discussing them.  --Masssiveego 05:06, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Well, Masssiveego, I think you probally should take a deeper look at some of your statements, some of your arguments really do seem a little odd..  Whilst I agree that you do have some valid reasons for your votes, taking a look at most of your history I'd say 85% of your votes are opposes and of those 85% the majority are "as above" etc.  I really don't know how long you look into information, but from your comments on my rfa, mostly regarding my bot, I think you might want to spend just a little bit more time fact checking. For example you made a quote saying that I was being unfriendly regarding the bot, and the poster themselves took a second to reply and say that there was no hostility, he was simply reporting an error that was promptly corrected.  I've also noted very very few non RfA related contribs, I don't want to sound offensive but are you sure you are really getting a perspective to vote without interacting with the user or the community at large, I think some more time on articles would really help put things into perspective. Perhaps a lot of voters don't look too deeply, I mostly vote based on talk page contribs and the overall friendliness of the user, perhaps talking to the user might help bring in another perspective that you didn't realize? I'm not trying to sound critical but a large number of editors have been questioning some of your votes, I'm just trying to suggest ways that might help you get a better perspective -- Tawker 01:43, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: The suggestion above has been well noted.  The main problem with the above RFA was haste.  The only time I have any discussion is when the RFA 
canidate is questioned.  At which point the answers, if any, from these
canidates shape my response.  While some of answers do appear odd, typically it's because the wikipedia at large seems to have limited
experiences from which a habit has already been formed from.  The differences in cultural backgrounds may account for this "oddness".  
Just because it's in english, does not necessarily means it's
in the english culture.   
As for the bot let me use my translation of the message.
Re: Tawkerbot2
This is in response to your reply on my talk page to feedback I left on the bot's talk page.
As for the message left on editors' talk pages, my personal preference leans towards something more technical and less conversational. That lead to my "thanks for experimenting, now frig off" interpretation, because that's how I imagined an innocent aggrieved editor taking the comment when the revert was wrong. FWIW, I'd lean more towards something along the lines of:
Your recent edit of some article was reverted by an automated bot that attempts to recognize and repair vandalism to Wikipedia articles. If you were experimenting, know that everyone really is welcome to contribute, but tests should be done in the sandbox.If the bot reverted a legitimate edit, please accept our apologies – if you bring it to the attention of the bot's owner, we may be able to improve its behavior.
Or something like that. At least that's my 2 cents' worth and how I read your talk page post.
"The bot is a great idea in theory. "
(There is a problem with the bot.)
"Thanks for all the work you've put into it. "
(civil)
But please be careful and very conservative in practice. 
(something may be wrong with it.)
If you get too ambitious you'll get in trouble, because there is no way that the bot will be ever be able to reliably distinguish between all types of vandalism from good faith edits.  
(ambitious as in.. too much too soon.. therefore haste, haste is bad.  Proof that haste is a continued problem.)
Randomly reverting legitimate edits is another form of vandalism, after all! 
(the complaint about the bot)
Going for the obvious profanity, scatology, etc., will help a lot, but keep a close eye on it, and leave the rest to us mere mortals. 
(the suggestion)
"--Kbh3rdtalk 05:29, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:   Masssiveego's Votes  

message: Tawker was promoted at around 78%, with the last... 9 hours of his nom affected by the server outage. I'm wondering why Linuxbeak chose not to follow Essjay in adding on a couple of days to Jedi6's RFA (also around the same mark), and chose to promote instead, taking into account the oppose votes. I'm glad the guy got admin, which is what he wanted, but I have to question the circumstances. NSLE (T+C)(seen this?) at 04:36 UTC (2006-04-10)
:While extending it would have been nice, there likely would not have been enough oppose votes made in the short time to tip the scales.  Additionally, there is no policy, or precedent (that I know of) for extending it.  That said, I think extending Jedi's nom by a more than day and a half for a nine hour outage is completely innapropriate and potentially unfair, and should be reduced.  --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 04:47, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Did you mean Tawker? Either way, that would be unfair. Maybe extend it for nine hours, if you must? SushiGeek 05:05, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, this appears to have been moved (in part) to my talk page, just a link for people to see. -- Tawker 05:06, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, I said Jedi6's, which has been extended almost two days.  --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 05:07, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: iirc, there is no formal policy for situations when the servers go down. So it goes down to the judgement of any bureaucrat who wants to process it first. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:12, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I see no issue with Tawker's promotion since it's up to the bureaucrat's discretion as to whether to extend or not in this case I think the right decision was made to not extend Tawker's nom. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 00:37, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tawker's promotion 

message: I have a simple solution to virtually eliminating the sockpuppet problem. You can not participate in an RFA if your account was created on the same day as the RFA. Plain and simple! Comment, please. Linuxbeak (drop me a line) 14:11, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd amend this to include people who's first edit is their vote as well.--Urthogie 14:17, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I would go one step further and say that you cannot participate in an RFA if your account was created within a week of the participation.  Yes, I know that there may be someone who was previously not registered and has a legitimate beef with an editor and wants to create an account solely to comment, but I think someone should understand that if they choose not to create an account, this is just one of those things that they will not be able to do. -- DS1953 talk 14:20, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: (grr, edit conflict) I would generally like to see some mild suffrage requirements: you should not be able to vote, only comment, if your account is newer than a month and has less than 50 edits at the time the RfA starts. (Or some other arbitrary low numbers that make sure any reasonably good contributor can vote). Most other language Wikipedias seem to have such requirements for voting. Kusma (討論) 14:22, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed.  Anyone should be allowed to comment regardless of any requirements for voting.--Urthogie 14:26, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: There are rarely (if ever) useful comments from anonymous/very new users anyway, semi-protection is a good idea. Martin 14:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I'm usually the first to suggest other solutions to a semi-protect (at least, with regards to folks wanting to protect Harry Potter-related articles), but in this case, semi-protection is actually a weaker suffrage than what is being proposed (or has been proposed in the past). With the current definition of "very new" being four days, this is an incredibly weak suffrage for RFA, but one that is easy to implement. On the other hand, this does go against the policies currently set out in WP:SEMI, so it might require a policy change, which is quit a problem to do. OTOH, it's true, sockpuppets and new users voting are usually not a problem: there's often at least one user "watching over" an RFA who can immediately point out these problematic voters. --Deathphoenix ʕ 15:12, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: When sockpuppetry does happen, it puts great stress on the candidate and makes the RfA ugly and appearing to be "controversial" although it isn't. It is also no fun to accuse people of sockpuppetry. Hard rules are much fairer and easier in this case: votes by people not having suffrage could be moved into an extra section and not have the discussion about them fill all of the regular voting section. Kusma (討論) 15:16, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: This also suggests that regardless of whether people add comments about possible newuser or sock activity, that the bureacrats would be well served to check things more closely when the consensus isn't as clear cut. And I'm expecting they do, whether or not people help out. But helping out presumably makes things easier for them... ++Lar: t/c 16:02, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think my RfA is more likely an oddity than the norm. :-) Jedi6-(need help?) 17:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I protest, as that's too low. So here we are: To be able to vote, you must be here for 2 months, have 1000 edits, out of which 100 project edits, 250 user talk edits, have worked on some featured article, and have 95.5% edit summary usage! I mean, we need serisous dedicated people to vote, and not just everybody. And if somebody has three sockpuppets all satisfying these criteria, let them all vote, no? Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 23:29, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: These proposals are all far too liberal.  Only members and former members of the Arbitration Committee should be allowed to vote.  We must restore sanity to Wikipedia! Kelly Martin (talk) 23:39, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The ArbCom should not usurp power that belongs to Jimbo alone. One-man votes are also make counting easier. Kusma (討論) 23:50, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Obviously not strict enough. The user must go on a quest and do at least 3 of the following: 1) rescue a helpless princess, 2) resuce a helpless prince 3) destroy an evil Darlord, 4) destroy an evil magical artifact, 5) kill a dragon 6) prove the Riemman Hypothesis. In fact, now that it comes down it, I dont think Jimbo has doen any of those, so I guess to be fair he shouldn't be allowed to vote. Presumably zero votes means no consensus, so all adminships will fail until Jimbo hurries up and complete's his quests. Anyone know any dragons needing slaying? JoshuaZ 00:03, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Oh, it's okay ^_^. As for the above, how about 2 weeks and 250 edits? :) — Deckiller 03:13, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: My vote is going to be biased, since I don't even meet those requirements, and I participate in the RfAs. But bias aside, I'm liking the time requirement, but I don't think the edit requirement should be that strict. Some users, especially in their first few weeks at Wikipedia, would rather sit and observe before they jump into things. Also, we don't want to give the impression to less frequent editors that they don't have a say in how Wikipedia works. Even an edit count of 20 would ensure that new users know what Wikipedia is about before voting, and it would also discourage sockpuppets; if they *tried* to make twenty edits, it would be very suspicious.(^'-')^ Covington 01:45, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Simple solution to sockpuppetry 

message: I would like to collect some data, just for comparison. On de: to be allowed to vote on RfA you need 200 article space edits and two months, on fr: it is 3 months and 300 "significant" (non-botlike etc.) edits. nl: has one month and 100. Other languages, anyone? Kusma (討論) 21:01, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think it's a fair comparison here. Each language operates independently of each other, and the voting rules and promotion guidelines vary from language to language. For example, on nl, it is strict voting - anyone above a certain percentage (80 percent, I think) is automatically promoted. That's why they have strict voting suffrage requirements. Also, because of that, in nl bureaucrats aren't given the responsibility of deciding consensus - it's a strict number count. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 00:45, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: On ru: you need five edits prior to the nomination. Conscious 04:38, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: In the Italian Wikipedia: logged in user, registered at least 30 days before start of nomination, and having done at least 50 edits it:Wikipedia:Amministratori/Sistema_di_voto/Requisiti - Liberatore(T) 13:30, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I like what they do in ru: - let us adopt that, my friends. bd2412 T 18:44, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, five edits is a nice small number, and the requirement of having them before a nomination could help avoid sockpuppet votes. — TheKMantalk 18:53, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The downside is that you can create ten accounts now, make five edits with each and use them for all the following nominations. Conscious 19:21, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the purpose of the requirements would be to discount votes by suspiciously new users, rather than to legalize sockpuppet voters that pass the requirements. — TheKMantalk 19:26, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: If someone wants to go to the trouble of setting up a sock puppet to lie in wait, anything we come up with isn't going to be a huge hurdle.  I think, as TheKMan pointed out above, the requirement of having the edits  before a nomination could help avoid sockpuppet votes, which seem to be triggered, on occasion, by a particular nomination. -- DS1953 talk 19:39, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I'm agreeing with TheKMan and DS1953. Also, having a minimum number of votes - even just five - would also make sure that well-intentioned new users know how Wikipedia works before casting a vote. (^'-')^ Covington 01:26, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Ten edits and seven days registration prior to opening of nomination. John Reid 23:34, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think 11 edits and 6.5 days is better. -Splashtalk 23:50, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmmm, then how about 1 year and 50,000 edits. ;-) bd2412 T 23:54, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Guess who just passed 50k edits last month ;-) Seriously, is setting a specific number really so bad? Kusma (討論) 23:59, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Didn't we say that 50,000 edits is mandatory retirement level? Wikipedia can't take any more of those carpel tunnel lawsuits ;-). NoSeptember talk 00:19, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suffrage requirements on other language editions 

message: RGTraynor removed the standard questions from his/her RfA - here. I have assumed for now that this was unintentional and have added them back. I just wondered if there is any precedent for the intentional removal of such questions by the candidate. Cheers TigerShark 09:08, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There are a few editors who have opted to not answer them; they are not obligatory, although they are certainly traditional. Given the excessive number of questions that have started appearing on RfAs lately, I'm almost moved to say "Bravo!" Essjay Talk • Contact 09:33, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Fair comment, but I wonder if deleting, rather than just not answering them, would be the right thing to do (unless they were obviously nonsense or bad faith). That might possibly give the wrong impression. Certainly, I think that once the candidate answers the questions (and especially if "voters" have commented on those answers) - they should not be removed as they then form an integral part of the RfA. This is what happened in this case, but as far as I know it was a mistake. Cheers TigerShark 09:49, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Who "owns" the candidate's RfA page? (answer, it's a wiki, no one does, not even the candidate) I guess I'm slightly supportive of 'crats using their good judgement and removing out and out silly questions/answers (but on the other hand, not very supportive, because I think they humanise things, within reason, and what's the harm?), but not at all supportive of the candidates themselves removing questions. Once a question is asked, the candidate ought to answer it, or choose not to, and leave it unanswered, but not remove it. If this practice of deliberately removing questions that weren't maliciously placed spreads, it might become a factor in some people's voting statement of opinion, well mine at least. RfA is supposed to be a discussion. Within reason, more questions mean more discussion and more understanding. (this is setting me up to get 94 questions, I am sure of it!) ++Lar: t/c 11:22, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: He's talking about the standard three questions themselves getting removed, not added questions by other users. Ëvilphoenix Burn! 14:04, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe he is, in this specific case. But Essjay DID remove some (increasingly silly?) ones from a different RfA. Since he drew the "silly line" just AFTER my questions, maybe I feel lucky... but I would not have removed as many as he did. That said, he's a bureacrat and I'm not, meaning his judgement is more seasoned on this (by loads) than mine is... ++Lar: t/c 14:28, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Um, no, I didn't. Look at the history. A regular old admin removed questions, I had nothing to do with it. Essjay Talk • Contact 02:26, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You've said "no I didn't" twice (here, and farther down) so I'll apologise twice (I already did farther down but it merits saying again/before/whatever), I was wrong, I wasn't paying close attention, I should have checked the history instead of relying on faulty memory, and I'm sorry. No slight or impugn was intended! I do agree you should find a different Mindspillage pic though, and fully intend to take you to task on that every chance i get. ++Lar: t/c 23:29, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I do rather object to bureaucrats opting to remove questions on the basis of being bureaucrats. We hand the 'crats power over the outcomes of this process, not over how the community conducts its deliberations. It is not up to the 'crats what questions a candidate should and should not be asked; it is up to them whether to answer them or not, and people can remove them if they really must in their capacity as an editor. Bureaucrats have had this slightly overbearing view of their RfA-superpowers before, when they attempted to directly suspend the process: but they control only the end, not all the means unto it. -Splashtalk 01:12, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Um, to be clear I was deferring to Essjay's judgement (rather grudgingly, because i thought they were worthy questions) not precisely because he was a 'crat, but rather that knowing he was one, I knew he had been around a lot longer than I and had more seasoning, and further, because I trust his judgement (more or less, except when it comes to photoshopping Mindspillage pictures, but I digress)... I or anyone else could still revert those removals, he doesn't own the page any more than any of the rest of us do. Heck I might go revert them now, I dunno. ++Lar: t/c 02:19, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just like to point out, you're wrong: I didn't remove questions from any RfA. I removed an innapropriate commment from an RfA; questions were removed from the same RfA, but not by me, check the history. Shanel moved the questions to the talk page, not I. Essjay Talk • Contact 02:28, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Right, apologies. I was shooting a little blind on the back of Lar's comment. Essjay says that he didn't remove them, so there's no problen. -Splashtalk 02:29, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: And another set of apologies here. You did not remove the jokey stuff, you removed stuff that was wildly inappropriate after BorgHunter removed the jokey questions (and Shanel moved them to talk). My bad. It was all pretty fast. But details schmetails. My point stands, I tend to trust your judgement (even about stuff you didn't do!) and in general am willing to shortcut a bit on who to trust, people on arbcomm, 'crats... how did they get there? By having more experience and more good sense because of that more experience (and if in general people don't feel that way it sort of says they think the process is broken)... is any of this making any sense?  ++Lar: t/c 02:43, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: On the important issue (the photoshopping), my only complaint is the constant use of the same image. I would like to point out to Essjay that many nice pics can be found from the various Wiki Meetup galleries :-). NoSeptember talk 23:18, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Removal of questions

message: I use Interiot's tool for counting a Requesting User's edits (I don't have editcountitis, just so you know) but now that the Replication Lag is up to 2 days (and keeps on rising), how will we be able to see the progress of the User's edits if Wikipedia data is no longer updated? Funnybunny 14:55, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There's nothing unusual about the current replication lag - it's been known to lag for a few days at times. The time will eventually decrease. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 14:56, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, the toolserver is no longer receiving updates from enwiki. The replication lag will get ever-longer until that problem is fixed. -Splashtalk 14:59, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Actually, it's a little more serious than a general lag at this point - see User_talk:Interiot for details. -- MarcoTolo 15:01, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the details - I didn't realize that the toolsever wasn't receiving updates. Flcelloguy (A note?) 15:06, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: You could try Wikipedia:WikiProject edit counters/Flcelloguy's Tool or Interiot's Tool2. -Splashtalk 14:59, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This is one of the primary reasons that I started the tool. Although I haven't been working on it recently due to a lack of time and technical prowess, thanks to the great skills and efforts of the members of the WikiProject, the tool is now better than ever and serves as an adequate backup when the toolserver is down. Because it is independent of the toolserver, it is not affected by any technical issues - all it requires is that Wikipedia is up and running. :-) Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 15:12, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Will they be able to fix this? Funnybunny 15:07, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Brion has commented on this  RicDod 15:14, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Can some people just stop saying that sort of thing because it's been said many times before? :) -Splashtalk 15:54, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Dunno if I am a "frequent voter" or not but if it's permanently gone I probably will vote less. When I can't make up my mind, either I do research, or I don't vote. One class of research I do is to look in various namespaces to judge the candidate's contributions. Not looking for absolute percentages but am looking for signs the candidate does/does not understand policy, does/does not help shape policy, does/does not engage in constructive discussion with users, does/does not help resolve contention in articlespace, and so forth. Just looking at their contributions the raw/onwiki way is a way but the contribution tree helps a lot as it is more efficient. Note that since the recent change to contribution to allow filtering by namespace, using the onwiki way is certainly easier than it was previously (and bravo to whatever developer *cough* Robchurch *cough*  did it). If I can't satisfy myself in a certain time spent, I won't vote. More efficient tools mean a greater fraction of "satisfy in a certain time spent". Hope that helps. ++Lar: t/c 15:56, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Heh, ok. Actually for what it's worth, I miss the edit counter, I like seeing *my* edits. Stevage 15:57, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Heh back, because I bet you were expecting a bunch of people to admit they have editcountitis and won't vote for people unless they have x% this and y% that and a contribution pattern that isn't a bell curve and etc. Right? Smile. ++Lar: t/c 16:40, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't think the down toolserver will affect RfA for at least a couple of weeks -- not for me anyway. I don't really care what a nominee has done yesterday or last week (unless it's truly exceptional, therefore not a countable thing). I want to see overall editing for the last several months and this is still available. When the lag grows to an appreciable fraction of the minimum length of membership I'll consider (currently 3 mo), then I'll worry about the toolserver. John Reid 22:48, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  General agreement, but I would be highly annoyed to be missing oh say the last month of a user's edits then I'll be pretty concerned. JoshuaZ 00:42, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Replication Lags on Interiot's edit counting tool