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== About RfB == |
== About RfB == |
Revision as of 12:08, 3 March 2020
if nominations haven't updated. |
RfB candidate | S | O | N | S % | Status | Ending (UTC) | Time left | Dups? | Report |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Jo-Jo Eumerus | 103 | 29 | 4 | 78 | Unsuccessful | 09:54, 6 March 2020 | 0 hours | no | report |
WereSpielChequers | 161 | 14 | 2 | 92 | Successful | 17:57, 3 March 2020 | 0 hours | no | report |
SilkTork | 168 | 8 | 2 | 95 | Successful | 12:25, 3 March 2020 | 0 hours | no | report |
RfB candidate | S | O | N | S % | Status | Ending (UTC) | Time left | Dups? | Report |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Jo-Jo Eumerus | 103 | 29 | 4 | 78 | Unsuccessful | 09:54, 6 March 2020 | 0 hours | no | report |
WereSpielChequers | 161 | 14 | 2 | 92 | Successful | 17:57, 3 March 2020 | 0 hours | no | report |
SilkTork | 168 | 8 | 2 | 95 | Successful | 12:25, 3 March 2020 | 0 hours | no | report |
Requests for adminship (RfA) is the process by which the Wikipedia community decides who will become administrators (also known as admins), who are users with access to additional technical features that aid in maintenance. Users can either submit their own requests for adminship (self-nomination) or may be nominated by other users. Please be familiar with the administrators' reading list, how-to guide, and guide to requests for adminship before submitting your request. Also, consider asking the community about your chances of passing an RfA.
This page also hosts requests for bureaucratship (RfB), where new bureaucrats are selected.
If you are new to participating in a request for adminship, or are not sure how to gauge the candidate, then kindly go through this mini guide for RfA voters before you participate.
There is an experimental process that you may choose to use to become an administrator instead of this process, called administrator elections. Details are still being worked out, but it is approved for one trial run which will likely take place in 2024.
About administrators
The additional features granted to administrators are considered to require a high level of trust from the community. While administrative actions are publicly logged and can be reverted by other administrators just as other edits can be, the actions of administrators involve features that can affect the entire site. Among other functions, administrators are responsible for blocking users from editing, controlling page protection, and deleting pages. However, they are not the final arbiters in content disputes and do not have special powers to decide on content matters, except to enforce the community consensus and the Arbitration Commitee rulings by protecting or deleting pages and applying sanctions to users.
About RfA
Candidate | Type | Result | Date of close | Tally | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
S | O | N | % | ||||
Pickersgill-Cunliffe | RfA | Successful | 15 Jun 2024 | 201 | 0 | 0 | 100 |
Elli | RfA | Successful | 7 Jun 2024 | 207 | 6 | 3 | 97 |
DreamRimmer | RfA | Withdrawn by candidate | 31 May 2024 | 45 | 43 | 14 | 51 |
Numberguy6 | RfA | Closed per WP:SNOW | 27 May 2024 | 5 | 23 | 2 | 18 |
ToadetteEdit | RfA | Closed per WP:NOTNOW | 30 Apr 2024 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
The community grants administrator access to trusted users, so nominees should have been on Wikipedia long enough for people to determine whether they are trustworthy. Administrators are held to high standards of conduct because other editors often turn to them for help and advice, and because they have access to tools that can have a negative impact on users or content if carelessly applied.
Nomination standards
The only formal prerequisite for adminship is having an extended confirmed account on Wikipedia (500 edits and 30 days of experience).[1] However, the community usually looks for candidates with much more experience and those without are generally unlikely to succeed at gaining adminship. The community looks for a variety of factors in candidates and discussion can be intense. To get an insight of what the community is looking for, you could review some successful and some unsuccessful RfAs, or start an RfA candidate poll.
If you are unsure about nominating yourself or another user for adminship, you may first wish to consult a few editors you respect to get an idea of what the community might think of your request. There is also a list of editors willing to consider nominating you. Editors interested in becoming administrators might explore adoption by a more experienced user to gain experience. They may also add themselves to Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls; a list of names and some additional information are automatically maintained at Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls. The RfA guide and the miniguide might be helpful, while Advice for RfA candidates will let you evaluate whether or not you are ready to be an admin.
Nominations
To nominate either yourself or another user for adminship, follow these instructions. If you wish to nominate someone else, check with them before making the nomination page. Nominations may only be added by the candidate or after the candidate has signed the acceptance of the nomination.
Notice of RfA
Some candidates display the {{RfX-notice}}
on their userpages. Also, per community consensus, RfAs are to be advertised on MediaWiki:Watchlist-messages and Template:Centralized discussion. The watchlist notice will only be visible to you if your user interface language is set to (plain) en
.
Expressing opinions
All Wikipedians—including those without an account or not logged in ("anons")—are welcome to comment and ask questions in an RfA. Numerated (#) "votes" in the Support, Oppose, and Neutral sections may only be placed by editors with an extended confirmed account[2] and only after the RfA has been open for 48 hours.[3]
If you are relatively new to contributing to Wikipedia, or if you have not yet participated on many RfAs, please consider first reading "Advice for RfA voters".
There is a limit of two questions per editor, with relevant follow-ups permitted. The two-question limit cannot be circumvented by asking questions that require multiple answers (e.g. asking the candidate what they would do in each of five scenarios). The candidate may respond to the comments of others. Certain comments may be discounted if there are suspicions of fraud; these may be the contributions of very new editors, sockpuppets, or meatpuppets. Please explain your opinion by including a short explanation of your reasoning. Your input (positive or negative) will carry more weight if supported by evidence.
To add a comment, click the "Voice your opinion" link for the candidate. Always be respectful towards others in your comments. Constructive criticism will help the candidate make proper adjustments and possibly fare better in a future RfA attempt. Note that bureaucrats have been authorized by the community to clerk at RfA, so they may appropriately deal with comments and !votes which they deem to be inappropriate. You may wish to review arguments to avoid in adminship discussions. Irrelevant questions may be removed or ignored, so please stay on topic.
The RfA process attracts many Wikipedians and some may routinely oppose many or most requests; other editors routinely support many or most requests. Although the community currently endorses the right of every Wikipedian with an account to participate, one-sided approaches to RfA voting have been labeled as "trolling" by some. Before commenting or responding to comments (especially to Oppose comments with uncommon rationales or which feel like baiting) consider whether others are likely to treat it as influential, and whether RfA is an appropriate forum for your point. Try hard not to fan the fire. Remember, the bureaucrats who close discussions have considerable experience and give more weight to constructive comments than unproductive ones.
Discussion, decision, and closing procedures
Most nominations will remain active for a minimum of seven days from the time the nomination is posted on this page, during which users give their opinions, ask questions, and make comments. This discussion process is not a vote (it is sometimes referred to as a !vote, using the computer science negation symbol). At the end of the discussion period, a bureaucrat will review the discussion to see whether there is a consensus for promotion. Consensus at RfA is not determined by surpassing a numerical threshold, but by the strength of rationales presented. In practice, most RfAs above 75% support pass.
In December 2015 the community determined that in general, RfAs that finish between 65 and 75% support are subject to the discretion of bureaucrats (so, therefore, almost all RfAs below 65% will fail). However, a request for adminship is first and foremost a consensus-building process.[4] In calculating an RfA's percentage, only numbered Support and Oppose comments are considered. Neutral comments are ignored for calculating an RfA's percentage, but they (and other relevant information) are considered for determining consensus by the closing bureaucrat.
In nominations where consensus is unclear, detailed explanations behind Support or Oppose comments will have more impact than positions with no explanations or simple comments such as "yep" and "no way".[5] A nomination may be closed as successful only by bureaucrats. In exceptional circumstances, bureaucrats may extend RfAs beyond seven days or restart the nomination to make consensus clearer. They may also close nominations early if success is unlikely and leaving the application open has no likely benefit, and the candidate may withdraw their application at any time for any reason.
If uncontroversial, any user in good standing can close a request that has no chance of passing in accordance with WP:SNOW or WP:NOTNOW. Do not close any requests that you have taken part in, or those that have even a slim chance of passing, unless you are the candidate and you are withdrawing your application. In the case of vandalism, improper formatting, or a declined or withdrawn nomination, non-bureaucrats may also delist a nomination. A list of procedures to close an RfA may be found at WP:Bureaucrats. If your nomination fails, then please wait for a reasonable period of time before renominating yourself or accepting another nomination. Some candidates have tried again and succeeded within three months, but many editors prefer to wait considerably longer before reapplying.
Current nominations for adminship
if nominations have not updated.
About RfB
Requests for bureaucratship (RfB) is the process by which the Wikipedia community decides who will become bureaucrats. Bureaucrats can make other users administrators or bureaucrats, based on community decisions reached here, and remove administrator rights in limited circumstances. They can also grant or remove bot status on an account.
The process for bureaucrats is similar to that for adminship above; however the expectation for promotion to bureaucratship is significantly higher than for admin, requiring a clearer consensus. In general, the threshold for consensus is somewhere around 85%. Bureaucrats are expected to determine consensus in difficult cases and be ready to explain their decisions.
Create a new RfB page as you would for an RfA, and insert
{{subst:RfB|User=Username|Description=Your description of the candidate. ~~~~}}
into it, then answer the questions. New bureaucrats are recorded at Wikipedia:Successful bureaucratship candidacies. Failed nominations are at Wikipedia:Unsuccessful bureaucratship candidacies.
At minimum, study what is expected of a bureaucrat by reading discussions at Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship including the recent archives, before seeking this position.
While canvassing for support is often viewed negatively by the community, some users find it helpful to place the neutrally worded {{RfX-notice|b}}
on their userpages – this is generally not seen as canvassing. Like requests for adminship, requests for bureaucratship are advertised on the watchlist and on Template:Centralized discussion.
Please add new requests at the top of the section immediately below this line.
Current nominations for bureaucratship
Jo-Jo Eumerus
- The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for bureaucratship that did not succeed. Please do not modify it.
Final (103/29/4); ended 09:54, 6 March 2020 (UTC) - This RfB is closed as unsuccessful. Thank you to the candidate for standing. There was a good amount of support, but just too much well-argued opposition for it to reach consensus Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:54, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
Nomination
Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) – I am delighted to present Jo-Jo Eumerus for consideration as a bureaucrat. He has been editing actively and consistently since mid-2015, an admin since mid-2016, and has amassed over 70,000 edits.
Jo-Jo Eumerus is a thoughtful and level-headed admin. His content creation is impressive, and includes several FAs and GAs, primarily in the fields of geology and physical geography. On the administrative side of the project, Jo-Jo Eumerus has distinguished himself in closing deletion discussions, where he can always be relied on to deliver a careful and dispassionate closure to contentious and complex discussions. Jo-Jo Eumerus is a voice of reason at meta-discussions, particularly to do with RfA and administrators.
The recent crat chat does show that new blood in the bureaucrat corps could be a good thing. Jo-Jo Eumerus would very much be "new blood" relative to the other bureaucrats. While an established and very active administrator, he hasn't been around for over a decade or served in other advanced administrative roles. His input to bureaucrat matters would very much offer a needed new perspective. Jo-Jo Eumerus would be an excellent addition to the bureaucrat corps, and I hope you will agree with sentiment. Maxim(talk) 21:06, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I hereby accept the nomination. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:10, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
Questions for the candidate
Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as a bureaucrat. You may wish to answer the following optional questions to provide guidance for participants:
- 1. Have you read the discussions on when to promote and not promote? What do you understand the criteria for promotion to be?
- A: I've been following discussions of how the RfX process operates, including all past and recent bureaucrat discussions. At RfA there is a general principle - last put in that form in a RfC four years ago - that normally a RfA with over 75% support is successful, one with less than 65% is considered unsuccessful (each percentage does not count neutral !voters) and in between there is a so-called "discretionary range". It is not simply a matter of a numerical percentage - especially in "discretionary" cases the arguments laid out by the !voters are of utmost importance. Common aspects that !voters consider are the experience (e.g edit count, the length of one's editing career, work done in areas where one plans to use administrator tools), one's understanding of policies and guidelines (e.g the various deletion-associated policies and notability guidelines, when the candidate plans to work in these areas), one's interaction with others (e.g how one approaches conflicts and disagreements with other editors), what one plans to do with administrator tools and often also content work (standards vary on this one, for example some are satisfied with the creation of a few decent articles, while others want to see some audited content such as a featured article or a good article, and some give it little attention). On the basis of such considerations and others !voters stipulate whether they consider someone's promotion to adminship as beneficial for the project (or not), and it is the task of the bureaucrats to determine from such arguments, the rationales underpinning them and the strength of support (or opposition) whether there is a consensus or not to promote.
- 2. How would you deal with contentious nominations where a decision to promote or not promote might be criticized?
- A: That depends on the details of what "contentious" means, but there are in general two routes. The first and nowadays more usual route is to open up a bureaucrat discussion (or "crat chat") and invite the input of the other bureaucrats as to whether the nomination has a consensus for promotion. Typically the bureaucrat opening the discussion summarizes the state of the nomination, the arguments contained therein and whether they consider the nomination to have a consensus. In such discussions, the other (unrecused; it's expected that bureaucrats who participated in the nomination as !voters recuse both from closing it and from the corresponding bureaucrat chat) bureaucrats will then provide their own analysis and arguments as to whether the nomination should be considered successful or not. There is no written-down procedure on how to close a crat chat but it's been occurring via a headcount of all these who see a consensus/don't see a consensus The second procedure would be to make an assessment of whether the contentious nomination has a consensus (or not) and implement it (by promoting or not promoting) with a summary that describes the state of the nomination (the arguments laid out) and the thought process that led the bureaucrat to come to their conclusion regarding (the absence of) consensus. Really, this summary and thought process can and is usually done also during a bureaucrat chat. Even in dissent, Wikipedians are generally willing to accept decisions that go against their preference providing that their stance was given due consideration, the various viewpoints were fairly considered and the process leading to the decision was understandable to others ("transparent").
- 3. Wikipedians expect bureaucrats to adhere to high standards of fairness, knowledge of policy and the ability to engage others in the community. Why do you feel you meet those standards?
- A: In my admin career I've closed a number of mostly deletion discussions where the outcome was not unambiguous, and I had the perception that I can come to a fair and acceptable assessment of the consensus in a discussion (or about its absence in a "no consensus" case) by impartially and carefully analyzing and summarizing all the offered arguments and applicable policies/guidelines/customs with a conclusion. I've received a fair amount of positive feedback on such analyses/summaries and on my Wikipedia work in general. Sometimes I get asked why I came to a given conclusion, a clarification of how I came to the conclusion, or someone requests a reconsideration of something I did (I am not just talking about administrator actions; I treat similar requests about non-admin actions such as regular editing the same); in these cases I either explain why I took the given action, or if I feel that it was inappropriate I reverse it. Sometimes I go back and evaluate my past decisions on my own account, to see how they worked out and whether they give advice for future actions. In my opinion, properly handling disagreements - including changing one's own stance when it's warranted to do so - is a key skill on any kind of collaborative project such as Wikipedia, as you are working with many other people who will not always agree with you, and there are many ways collaboration can end badly from poor handling of disagreement. Listening to others is essential especially (but not exclusively!) when you are an admin or bureaucrat working on the basis of consensus rather than one's own preference. Now when editing I am generally working on my own but I have also worked in collaborations with other editors, mainly in the ambit of featured content work.
- Additional question from Deryck Chan
- 4. What additional skills and experience do you think you will bring to the team of bureaucrats that make you a net positive in addition to the current bureaucrats and the other two candidates presented this week?
- A: Experience wise, the most important trait is probably that I come from a more recent wiki-generation. Depending on how you define "active" I did became active either in 2012 or 2015, while most current bureaucrats have joined long before that and often were already bureaucrats or admins by then. There are differences in perspective between people who were around in old times and those who joined up when Wikipedia had become more important and mature, for example in terms of handling concerns about bureaucratization (in the sense of Wikipedia procedures, not the bureaucrat user group) or the handling of new users when it becomes an issue in the RfX. Skills wise, I can carry out detailed summaries of the arguments presented, which can be helpful at determining the existence of consensus when the numbers don't say it all ... and most (not all, though) tough/contentious bureaucrat decisions are these where the numbers don't clearly indicate a consensus or its absence. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 21:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Pharaoh of the Wizards
- 5. Do you think this question "Have you edited under previous account" asked in several RFA as it appears by some editors as it appears to than that the candidate fails WP:DUCK is appropriate in the context of this Wikipedia:Clean start#Requests for adminship says candidates are not obliged to publicly disclose previous accounts.Do you think Candidates should disclose whether they had a previous account in a RFA (without the naming the account).Particurly for those making there clean start after conflict rather than privacy reasons.
- A: Regarding that question, I would consider it an appropriate question. Yes, it's not technically obligatory to answer it or to publicly disclose the answer (the page notes that a private disclosure to ArbCom is possible) but in the past we've had issues with questionable clean starts and coming clean about previous accounts is more honest and can prevent a lot of conflict that could ensue if a previous account was revealed after the RfX. Whether and how to answer it is of course up to the candidate. Regarding "do you think", in the name of honesty I would recommend a full disclosure especially in questionable cases; a clean start after a conflict is likely to be contentious when it gives the appearance of avoiding scrutiny. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 21:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- 6. Do Crats have the right to use there discretion rather WP:IAR in particular in resysoppings editors without the 24 hour wait or any discussion.
- A: I am a little unsure about what you asked here, but if you are asking about IAR in general I think it needs to be applied very sparingly in bureaucrat matters. People are not infallible and overturning or reviewing a bureaucrat action is much harder than, say, a page deletion. And the action can have large ramifications on e.g future deletions. The only case I can think of is when a bureaucrat is experimenting their admin rights by removing or readding them to their own bureaucrat account, although there probably are other scenarios. On the waiting period and discussion, I don't really see a situation where it would be necessary to skip them in order to improve the encyclopedia and it doesn't seem like these requirements so far have caused serious issues solely by existing, either. So I wouldn't do it except in unusual cases (IAR is to a large degree meant to cover unexpected situations, so I wouldn't categorically rule one out). Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 21:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional questions from Barkeep49
- 7. What do you make of the overlap in membership between Arbitrators and Bureaucrats? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:28, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Well, there is only a limited amount of people who are willing to seek such responsibilities and have the skill and experience to be entrusted with them, so it's both to be expected and not necessarily a bad thing given that the shared experience can be useful in some situations. Now in my personal opinion arb and crat are two fairly distinct responsibilities (mainly that arbs work as a collective and on the basis of their interpretation of a situation, crats work mostly on their own but they are expected to scrupulously stick to community consensus rather than "arbitrating") and I've seen problems with e.g arbs who are bureaucrats being asked to recuse in arb case requests that dealt with the outcome of the bureaucrat action, or controversial arbcom-mandated desysops where having the bureaucrats act as a sanity check was useful. So I'd probably recommend some separation. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 21:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- 8. Please explain what other functions besides Crat Chats on RFA candidates you see bureaucrats having. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:28, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Aside from the obvious (assessing RfXes that either have a clear consensus or have a clear lack of consensus and implementing the conclusion), bureaucrats also have the responsibility of enacting desysops and resysops, apply and remove the bot and interface administrator user rights, assessing whether an application for Bot Approval Groups membership has consensus in favour of granting and clerking RfX pages. If you mean hypothetical future roles: Over the years there have been proposals to create community-based deadminship processes, and some proposals included giving bureaucrats additional roles. As for whether they should get them (or any other additional responsibility in some other context), I think I'd need to see a concrete proposal to comment on it; my impression is that bureaucrats have often been wary of having their role expanded to take on responsibilities it didn't have when they applied for RfB as their skill in such an expanded role was not scrutinized when they received crat responsibilities. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 21:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional questions from QEDK
- 9. Do you believe trendlines should be used as an effective way of measuring consensus in RfAs? If yes, why, if not, why not?
- A: Sometimes. Even with many !voters, RfX pages are not so large and last not so long that trendlines cannot arise by mere coincidence (e.g if a few supporters find the RfA at the last day) so on their own they are not very indicative. Plus there is a concern flagged in the Money emoji crat chat that such trend lines may either be tactical voting, or that bureaucrats factoring them in might encourage tactical voting. Sometimes trends arise due to new revelations, e.g when someone discovers a past contentious edit by the candidate. In these cases one typically sees a clear change-point and often also vote switching. These trends can be an useful gauge. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- 10. As a crat, how would you have assessed Money emoji's RfA in the crat chat?
- A: Recusal in both, since I am support #123 on that RfA. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Jo-Jo Eumerus: What does "in both" mean here? --qedk (t 桜 c) 18:34, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Sorry, that was just bad wording - I would neither close the RfA nor partake in the crat chat except to document my recusal. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 20:43, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Jo-Jo Eumerus: What does "in both" mean here? --qedk (t 桜 c) 18:34, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Recusal in both, since I am support #123 on that RfA. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Follow-up question
- 10.1 This one is due to a failure to clarify the question beforehand on my part (your answer is technically correct, ofcourse). I wanted to seek your assessment of Money emoji's RfA as an example of how you'd practically approach contentious RfAs, so the same question, but hypothetically considering you had not participated in the RfA.
- A. Well, in that case I see that with 153support/66oppose we are in the middle of the range where bureaucrat discretion is usually applied, so to a bureaucrat discussion it would go. From an analysis of all the arguments presented, there are legitimate arguments both in favour of promotion and against it, and rebuttals too - for example, on whether copyright clerking requires admin tools, maturity and whether an outburst over a year ago are indicative of immaturity, and the ever-contentious content creation aspect and whether the content contributions have been oversold. I see a trend downwards in the support percentage over time, but there is not much vote switching or reconsideration going on (in fact, I am seeing lots of supporters reaffirming their prior stance) so I wouldn't attach that much importance to it. Going by strength of argument, a lot appears to be predicated on a retirement message that was posted over a year ago and there has never been a strong consensus that content creation is a requirement for adminship and these point tilt this towards "yes, there is consensus". Nevertheless I don't think I see a clear consensus here; yes there is lots of support but also lots of opposition, and while in other places a 2-1 ratio would be considered a clear consensus this is not how RfA currently operates. I agree incidentally that this is a very marginal RfA, and that neither a "consensus" nor a "no consensus" conclusion would be blatantly wrong. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 20:43, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- 11. Can you give some examples where you have closed contentious requests for comments in a panel or by yourself? If you don't have or recall any such RfCs, other contentious discussions with formal closure are also acceptable.
- A: I believe the most consequential discussion in my wiki-career I've closed is Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Health of Donald Trump, given its effects on the widely-read main biography (that AFD has been cited several times during discussions at Talk:Donald Trump).
- Additional question from Levivich
- 12. How would you !vote in a crat chat about the following hypothetical RFA:
- 200 !voters total
- 130 support !votes
- 20 "per nom"
- 20 "no concerns", "no big deal", "yes please", "easy support", or similar
- 20 "strong support" with a detailed rationale
- 20 re-affirming support after reviewing opposes
- 20 who changed from oppose to support in response to answers to questions
- 20 "weak support" agreeing with one or more oppose rationales
- 6 "per others", evenly split amongst the above
- 4 just a signature
- 70 oppose !votes
- 20 citing lack of content creation
- 20 citing a 3RR block from one year ago
- 10 citing an interpretation of the candidate's username
- 10 switching from support to oppose in response to other opposes
- 8 "per others", evenly split amongst the above
- 2 votes from accounts with 11 edits (not blocked)
- A: Sorry, just saw this one. That's at the lower side of the present-day discretionary range, so it would go to a bureaucrat chat most likely but the normal assumption would be that such a RfA is closed as "no consensus" unless the support case is singularly compelling or the oppose case singularly poor. Strength of argument is difficult to gauge from a summary, but judging by the number of weak supports, strong supports and vote changes in both directions it looks like there are strong arguments on both sides. I think I would be considering this a no consensus case; yes 130 supports are a lot but so are 70 opposes. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 20:55, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Can I Log In
- 13. Stewards. It's a global Wikipedia position. They typically only intervene in emergencies such as abuse of power by a bureaucrat. Other than emergencies, when do you think stewards should intervene in place of a bureaucrat. For example, a complete absence of bureaucrat when they are needed. Can I Log In (talk) 01:39, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- A: I can't really think of many instances. In general, established practice for Wikimedia stewards is that they do not apply their expanded access in a local project unless there is nobody on that local project who can do it or there is an emergency situation. From reading the steward discussions on Meta it seems like this principle is held to pretty stringently, and I think it's generally a good approach - there are many hundreds of projects in the Wikimedia family, all with their own particular idiosyncrasies and cultural conventions which would be easy to get wrong. So the only situation outside of an emergency I can see is when all bureaucrats have recused on a matter or are unavailable for some reason, but I don't think such a thing has ever happened on enwiki, certainly not in recent times. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:29, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
Discussion
- Links for Jo-Jo Eumerus: Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
- Edit summary usage for Jo-Jo Eumerus can be found here.
Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review their contributions before commenting.
Support
- Support An awesome administrator. All the way, you've my support. —Nnadigoodluck🇳🇬 09:14, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support- no concerns here. Reyk YO! 09:17, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support They’ll do fine. I recall giving one of their FACs a damn good kicking and they responded in a very Wikipedian manner. Gog the Mild (talk) 10:06, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support- Definitely. - FitIndia Talk Commons 10:32, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support – shows a solid understanding of policy as well as a lot of common sense. Sensible replies to questions, and I agree with the nominating statement. --bonadea contributions talk 10:47, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - no issues, sensible, calm, level headed and a good understanding of policy. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 10:51, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Reaffirming support. We need a diverse corpus of crats who are able to work as a team to assess difficult situations with diverting views. Opposing over that seems wide of the mark to me. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 08:44, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support – per nom. Maxim(talk) 10:53, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, strong content creator. GregJackP Boomer! 11:32, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Why not. Foxnpichu (talk) 11:38, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Per nom. SQLQuery me! 12:10, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- No compelling reason not to. Money emoji💵Talk💸Help out at CCI! 12:23, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - In the recent AfD/DRV on Race and intelligence showed willingness to help out in a careful and professional manner in a very difficult situation with a highly contentious article; does not shy away from challenges. NightHeron (talk) 12:44, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Good and helpful admin. Will make a good bureaucrat. PI Ellsworth ed. put'r there 13:01, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Dede2008 (talk) 13:16, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Good and level-headed admin, great judgment with consensus as far as I can tell, and I find the oppose rationale that there's too many bureaucrats to be patently ludicrous. The purpose of RfB (and RfA, for that matter) is to determine if the user can be trusted with the toolkit through their actions. A rationale such as "Too many 'crats" does not, in any way, consider whether the user is trustworthy to use the tools without issue, and essentially amounts to a boilerplate rationale, in my view. OhKayeSierra (talk) 13:19, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Something, something, WP:NOBIGDEAL... Steel1943 (talk) 13:22, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I see no reason not to, disregarding the rationale of "we have too many crats already", which I personally feel is irrelevant to JJE's ability to do the job. epicgenius (talk) 14:22, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support precious --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:30, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Enthusiastic Support For the same reasons I outlined in SilkTork's RfB nomination, Jo-Jo Eumerus is, unquestionably, one of our most impartial and objective administrators who is incredibly adept at assessing consensus, as demonstrated in The Simpsons portal namespace MfD discussion and the second AfD for Jo-Ann Roberts. We want and need impartiality and objectivity in our bureaucrats and we need more bureaucrats, so there is simply no reason not to. In reference to a couple of the procedural opposes that we only need two more bureaucrats, we're on pace to lose between 2-5 bureaucrats due to inactivity, so when you net those future bureaucrat losses out, even if we gain SilkTork and WeSpielChequers, we haven't gained any new bureaucrats. Doug Mehus T·C 14:31, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I'm reaffirming my support, which is still enthusiastic support, for Jo-Jo mainly per Lev's reaffirmation where he said, "
Some of the opposes boil down to "Jo-Jo weighs !votes in AFDs but shouldn't weigh !votes in RFAs". Well, sorry, we had an RFC about this not too long ago
," and because, also like Lev who writes, "You're going to oppose over one close you disagree with? Come on
," I'm not persuaded on the basis of one controversial discussion, which, I should add, was only in draft form and it's worth noting this would not have been the final outcome as Jo-Jo was to be only one member on the blue-ribbon committee. My understanding of such panel closes is that each panel member presents their interpretation of the arguments presented, including their weighting of the arguments, and then each panel member weighs each's interpretation, refuting points that are in error. It might also be helpful to further my interpretation of Jo-Jo's close in the first of my above-referenced examples in order to demonstrate they've got the demonstrated ability to close close closes. Though, as nominator of the Portal:The Simpsons MfD discussion, I felt the "delete" argument had the stronger argument, a "no consensus" outcome was entirely the reasonable close, particularly since Jo-Jo even notes the apparent strength and slight edge over the "keep" arguments in terms of a strict nosecount, but assessing consensus is not simply about counting !vote icons, it's about weighing the arguments. Jo-Jo considered the scope of WP:ATD, noted the point(s) on which the "delete" camp's argument was unrefuted, in whole or in part, by the "keep" camp and, likewise, where the "keep" camp's concerns were not completely addressed by the "delete" camp. In short, the close was accurate and accurately closed by an administrator per WP:BADNAC given the closeness of the arguments, and it would've likely been a bad super vote to have been closed as anything but "no consensus." So, give them the screwdriver as it will not be misused Doug M. T·C 11:58, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- I'm reaffirming my support, which is still enthusiastic support, for Jo-Jo mainly per Lev's reaffirmation where he said, "
- Support Definitely worthy of being a bureaucrat. Quahog (talk • contribs) 14:41, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support recent RfA illustrated the need for more bureaucrats. Nothing that the opposers have said would make me thing this person is unqualified. --rogerd (talk) 14:46, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I've reviewed Jo-Jo's articles many times and have been impressed by their common sense and level head. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:53, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per Doug Mehus's comment. N0nsensical.system(err0r?)(.log) 14:54, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Easy support. Levivich (talk) 15:07, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Reaffirming my support. Some of the opposes boil down to "Jo-Jo weighs !votes in AFDs but shouldn't weigh !votes in RFAs". Well, sorry, we had an RFC about this not too long ago, and while I thought RFA should be a straight vote, the community said it's still NOTAVOTE. Weighing consensus is what crats are supposed to do, per the community, recently. Saying the Jo-Jo isn't qualified because he weighs consensus doesn't make sense. Just as little sense as opposing because we have "too many" crats. I agree a glance at the RFB chart disproves that one. Finally, I am not persuaded by the opposers who are opposing because of Jo-Jo's draft Race and intelligence AFD close. You're going to oppose over one close you disagree with? Come on. – Levivich [dubious – discuss] 04:44, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Truly one of the best editors on the project. Understands how the whole thing works, has created much content, and knows where the bones are buried. Lightburst (talk) 15:15, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Solid editor and administrator. Calm, sensible, doesn't rush in and take sides, but will act in the best interests of the encyclopaedia - and that's the most that can be hoped of anyone. - SchroCat (talk) 15:56, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per Nightheron. ミラP 16:15, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Competent and sensible. – Ammarpad (talk) 16:49, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support The only reason to have bureaucrats at all, really, at this point is to close contentions RfA's. The contributions to the Race and Intelligence mess that JJE made show clearly that they are highly experienced and professional in assessing consensus in contentious discussions. They have clearly demonstrated competence and qualification for the right they are requesting. Whether that right needs to be given to anyone is not a question for an individual RfB. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 16:56, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support A great choice to become a bureaucrat. Abzeronow (talk) 17:09, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Level headed and honourable. Clearly has the best interests of the project in mind. -- Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 17:19, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support will be a net-positive. Also, the idea that keeping the 'crat role super exclusive just because there isn't a perceived "need" for 'crats is silly. More level-headed voices in the 'crat role can only help the project. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 17:26, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support while I disagreed with the candidate's stance regarding the AfD mentioned in the first oppose, I will not oppose this candidate over a lone AfD. This is a trusted user who is not likely to abuse crat status. I am unsympathetic to the argument that a crat promotion constitutes the loss of an admin, for the crat workload is very light. If we can trust the candidate to make good decisions when closing RfA, we should promote them. If we end up with a lot of crats, who cares? Why is that a problem? This recent series of RfBs is long overdue and I hope there will be more. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 17:32, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per Lepricavark: net positive. Puddleglum2.0 17:48, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support- Per above. A no-brainer IMO. Aloha27 talk 18:22, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support one of the opposers says "I don’t want someone with experience closing discussions". I think these are exactly the people we do want for the bureaucrat role. Helping to close RfAs in the discretionary range is now the main nontrivial bureaucrat task, and experience closing other contentious discussions is good preparation for that. Hut 8.5 19:03, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - seems like a reasonable request to me. NomadicNom (talk) 19:07, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - no concerns. GiantSnowman 19:27, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 21:27, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support No concerns. Oddly, it is the long-serving bureaucrats who seem to go off the rails, not the newly-minted ones. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:57, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support No concerns. --I am One of Many (talk) 22:36, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support experienced sysop who seems well suited to the role. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:46, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I respectfully disagree with the editors opposing below. I don't think an RfX nomination should be used as a proxy in the community disagreement on the vote/not vote issue. I think Jo-Jo's ability as a closer is the exact attribute we should be seeking in a crat, and I believe they will do a good job in this role. Specifically, I believe that Jo-Jo will follow and implement policies as written; for better or worse that means closing RfXs as discussions not as votes. For that reason I see no logic as to why Jo-Jos ability to close discussions in line with policy should disqualify them from being a bureaucrat. If RfX were to become a vote, I would maybe think differently, but it is not a vote despite the opinions of some editors in the oppose section. There are limited abilities for crats, and it may be worthwhile to hand most of these tasks off to stewards, but this is not the venue to evaluate that. Until we no longer need bureaucrats or the RfX policy changes, candidates who are qualified for the role should not be obstructed because of philosophical disagreements on the office they are seeking or policies they must apply. I support this request. — Wug·a·po·des 22:53, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support – RfA is not now, nor has it ever been, just a vote. In fact, for the longest time, people used to refer to it as "!vote" to distinguish it from a regular straw poll. Bureaucrats are tasked with determining consensus: "does the community trust this user with the administrative toolset?" That involves weighing arguments, reviewing evidence, and coming to a decision. Jo-Jo Eumerus gets this. He has nearly four years of experience as an administrator, and to the best of my knowledge, he's done a great job. He is plenty competent enough to handle bureaucratship. Kurtis (talk) 00:20, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support It seems quite a few of the crats are not very active, so new ones are always welcome and Jo-Jo Eumerus is well qualified. P-K3 (talk) 00:53, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, has a good amount of experience with the type of contentious closes that seem to be the main workload of a Bureaucrat, nothing in the opposes strikes me as disqualifying. Devonian Wombat (talk) 01:36, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Why not? Also noting that the opposes thus far are comedically unconvincing. -FASTILY 01:51, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, seems fine. -- Visviva (talk) 03:22, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per Dmehus. 1.02 editor (T/C) 03:51, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per the above commenters, especially Maxim, OhKayeSierra, Doug Mehus, Wug·a·po·des and Kurtis. As long as Wikipedia has bureaucrats and they have some functions, I cannot accept the proposition that we should not have any more because they aren't needed or aren't needed much. Also, given the importance of crat chats to determine consensus in close RfAs, I would rather see more than just a few crats add to the discussion and make a decision. Some current bureaucrats don't appear at all for these important discussions. I also can not accept that a candidate should be opposed based on a differences of opinion on philosophy, a reasonable difference of opinion on interpretation of a difficult policy, a difference on an AfD or an edit especially if it is ultimately correctable, and other minor problems with one or a few edits when the overall record and demeanor is good, probably excellent. I do not mind longer explanations in answers in these settings. I see that as an effort to cover all the details, which can be important and can lead to criticism if not opposition if an important or convincing detail is left out. The promotion of three administrators to bureaucrats at this time simply replaces the net loss of three from last year. With all of the praise and examples of Jo-Jo Eumerus's work noted above, and his excellent record, I believe he should be promoted to bureaucrat. Donner60 (talk) 05:55, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Appears to have the skills and temperament suitable for the function. · · · Peter Southwood (talk): 06:40, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support: I respect JJE's judgement. --K.e.coffman (talk) 08:58, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Not terribly convinced we need more crats (and not a huge fan of crat chats), but that's not a good argument against a good candidate. —Kusma (t·c) 10:29, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Don't see any issues here and some of the opposes are weak (or worse). Black Kite (talk) 11:14, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I've seen Jo-Jo Eumerus around quite a lot and I believe he will be a great bureaucrat! Class455 (talk|stand clear of the doors!) 12:43, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I've interacted with Jo-Jo a few times and seen them to be a quality Wikipedian who I think is well suited for this role. I am deeply unconvinced by the comments in opposition below - as I see at the recent, controversial AfD many of them are referencing, Jo-Jo has been doing their best to address the issue in a fair and reasonable manner. I was impressed by the long proposed draft deletion statement one opposer linked for its effective summary of what was an highly contentious and fairly heated debate among a large group of Wikipedians. Ganesha811 (talk) 14:08, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Answers are nuanced, explanatory and analytical, all requirements for a crat. But to be blunt, their answer to Q12 really warrants more, the overall assessment might be OK, but the nuance isn't coming through. Excellent temperament and track record as an admin nonetheless and the opposition might want to read WJBscribe's comment at SilkTork's RfB. --qedk (t 桜 c) 22:40, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- I am reaffirming my vote to highlight that fact that despite the opposition, I have no doubt JJE will be a good addition to the crat-corps given their predisposition towards reading consensus. I would also like to state that it is my viewpoint that this RfB should receive a crat chat (if the need arises) at the very least, it only makes sense given the significant support received and to enable a proper review of consensus instead of an unilateral close. --qedk (t 桜 c) 16:47, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Support for a good admin with good judgment. To draw a line in the sand and say "no more 'crats" is, IMO, silly. Miniapolis 22:41, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, JJE is competent and levelheaded, and I believe will make an excellent crat. Seraphimblade Talk to me 23:18, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support I have been impressed with JJE's experience as an admin. Reywas92Talk 06:44, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support per nom. Wikipedia needs more Bureaucrats. I can't see the candidate doing much harm in that capacity. The 'crat mandate is extremely limited, it's not like admins who have hundreds of different jobs to do - and get right . Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 07:59, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - 100% without reservation or hesitation. One of our best admins who has consistently shown good judgement. Atsme Talk 📧 08:04, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - sensible and on-the-ball. Also, some of those "oppose" are excellent reasons to support - David Gerard (talk) 12:16, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Looks good to me. Not a "hat collection" thing - I'm appalled to learn that most of the bureaucrats have been in the post for over a decade, and that three haven't edited yet this year. Those are clear signs that fresh eyes are needed, as part of succession. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 12:25, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Oh totally! Jo-Jo would bring a much needed unique experience to Crat-chats. It will be good having them around there, and they have solid judgement. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 14:38, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - It appears that the opposes largely have to do with concerns about the concept of bureaucrats, and that is a policy issue, not a reason to oppose a specific admin-for-bureaucrat. I thought that the candidate showed judgment and common sense in closing contentious portal deletion discussions, and a good admin may be a good crat (if we need crats, which isn't the issue). Robert McClenon (talk) 15:51, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - qualified candidate. The most recent crat chat proves this position is still needed. I don't want a bunch of mostly out-of-touch Wikipedians popping in to make judgement calls on close RFAs. ZettaComposer (talk) 15:54, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Has understanding of the procedures and policies as an admin, and how bureacrats work. Can I Log In (talk) 17:51, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support The candidate has a lot of experience as an admin, and will be a good bureaucrat. LPS and MLP Fan (Littlest Pet Shop) (My Little Pony) 18:45, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I am confident that Jo-Jo possesses the qualities that are desirable in 'crats. A9 is exactly the kind of reasoning that I would hope for from someone seeking this role. I believe that the so-called "rambling circumlocution" is to be expected when confronted with vague hypotheticals (GIGO). 3.5+ years as admin is sufficient experience to move up to the next level. - MrX 🖋
- Support I don't have any issues, and the opposes are not convincing. We need more bureaucrats anyway. ~EDDY (talk/contribs)~ 01:08, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I highly doubt Jo-Jo Eumerus will misuse the tools Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 01:50, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Tough one. I see a lot of the validity in the oppose rationales. SMcClandlish in particular demonstrates uncratlyness. Generally I prefer folk who are openly (if moderately) partisan. But for a crat it's preferable to have someone who's above the fractional fray, who fairly assesses consensus for the whole community. Still, probably the candidate will get better at this, if they get the crat hat. After sleeping on it, landing in support due to Maxim's point about the need for new blood. Regardless of the "analyses" pumped out by the OurWorldInData / Factfullness crowd, the Anglosphere's much more partisan, less temperate & emotionally gentle than it was a few decades back. I wonder if it's even possible to make classic crats anymore. So may be wisest to elevate some of the best young admins, even if they don't perfectly fit the mould. FeydHuxtable (talk) 07:54, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support, opposes are illogical in my view. Fish+Karate 09:57, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support for sure! Cabayi (talk) 10:47, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support, he'll do fine as a 'crat. BEANS X3 (talk) 13:42, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support, we do need more, and while some opposes may have a point, he will be fine. Johnbod (talk) 15:01, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - no obvious issues. Deb (talk) 15:21, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Have certainly seen the most excellent of work at closing/relisting AfD's and at times when I've challenged clousres/relists AfD's. I note the concerns in the opposes, and while I am not best experienced to analyze the weight of the opposes I am on balance minded to support. (Djm-leighpark) Djm-mobile (talk) 16:12, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Trustworthy admin; good answers to questions. Deryck C. 17:24, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support --DannyS712 (talk) 02:51, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Seen a lot of their closes at AfD and is a very thoughtful and percise editor; also willing to hear input/listen to other views. Having "too many crats" is a high quality problem in my view and should be welcomed (only that it would also occur in the admin corps); respecting TB's comments below, however, I think that Jo-Jo's analytical style will add to the diversity of input in crat chats rather than hinder or detract from them (and wishing that TB would also nominate himself as well). Britishfinance (talk) 10:51, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support – sgeureka t•c 16:18, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Calm, collaborative and receptive to critique, definitely feel this will be a good fit.--MONGO (talk) 17:03, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I see no valid reason to oppose. Also, I know there's some debate over this, but I think more bureaucrats wouldn't hurt if there's literally a dozen and a half of them... King of Scorpions 17:19, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support A good admin, no reason to expect less after assuming this new responsibility. --Crystallizedcarbon (talk) 18:18, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- JBL (talk) 23:44, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I have no questions about his judgement. I have read the oppose votes below, especially the well presented argument by Tony, but I don't find the qualities he objects as an impediment, rather I see it as a strength that someone is will to take careful consideration of a discussion and isn't just a blind rubber stamp; if we just wanted someone to count votes and flip a switch, a bot could do that. We promote people to advanced permissions based on their sound judgement. I have no doubt that Jo Jo has that in spades. --Jayron32 13:48, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Good admin, no concerns as a 'crat. Andy Dingley (talk) 15:37, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support The candidate seems to qualify, so I shall place my name in this column. Unlike other recent RfB's, however, this one seems to have a less apparent consensus so I am going to both !vote and address the two main reasons for oppose and why I think they are of lesser weight: Firstly, "We do not need more 'crats, as we have sufficient for the actions they do presently" - in 5, 10, or 27 years and a weeks time we are not going to have the services of the 'crats existing at the turn of this year. It is pretty shortsighted to NOW reduce the number of effective 'crats THEN by not promoting suitable candidates when they stand. While 'crat burnout may not exist, mortality does. Secondly, the notion that they may bring a slightly different viewpoint to bear in cratchats... why would anyone think that this could be anything but a good thing? Judging consensus is still a human skill by which an individual takes their understanding of the criteria and applies them - having the rest of those with that role sharing exactly the same interpretation results in an echo chamber. This makes the cratchat simply a reaffirmation. A very slightly different viewpoint will allow others to weigh their own judgement. Thirdly, those opposes based on an individual instance where they disagree with the conclusion in one matter have no weight at all in my mind. LessHeard vanU (talk) 17:17, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- No point writing an extended rationale when LessHeard vanU has already made it immediately above. This isn't an appointment to the Wikipedia Council of Cardinals; in the absence of any opposition rationale better than "but he might not agree with me on something!", I'll support anyone who wants the job. I don't for one instant believe that JJE is going to go rogue and start issuing unwarranted bot approvals or desysopping admins to whom he's taken a dislike (the only ways in which it's even technically possible to abuse the crat toolset), and I find the "but he might disagree with some of the other crats" opposes baffling—if a decision is so borderline that it needs to be discussed at length, we want input from people with differing views. ‑ Iridescent 17:28, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support--Ymblanter (talk) 19:50, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Experienced, dedicated administrator who is qualified for this position. I don't think we are in any danger of having "too many" bureaucrats any time soon, nor do I think 'cratship would take much time away from the other administrative work the candidate would continue to perform. Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:24, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support --Minorax (talk) 06:56, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support right now at the time I made this edit, you are at 78%, so here, have my support so you can pass, every net positive for Wikimedia Projects should be supported, and you do deserve one.--AldNonUcallin?☎ 17:56, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support would be net-positive as a crat in my opinion. --Kostas20142 (talk) 18:44, 5 March 2020 (UTC))
- Support I support Jo-Jo Eumerus Articute (talk) 19:36, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support as per Iridescent above Joseywales1961 (talk) 20:01, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- support crats are not paid monetarily by WMF. Technically speaking, the user level doesnt utilise/take up server resources. Does getting promoted as a crat hamper the performance of the admin as an admin? No. Like other people said: there is not much work for the crats. I dont see any problem with this candidate getting promoted to a crat, or any worthy candidate getting promoted as a crat. No logical reason to oppose. —usernamekiran (talk) 22:19, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I have had many good interactions and seen a lot of thier closes, especially when Jo-Jo helps out at TfD when there's a backlogged. They have always been well thought through and he is as have been shown in the opposition he is good at making non-predjudicial supervotes when it will help resolve the discussion. I take this not as a negative as some opposers did but as a very good attribute which shows experience and competence in closing disscussions in a way that makes everyone happy with the end result without requireing endless time consuming discussions. I also don't find opposition based solely on us already having enough crats very weak and honestly bordering on unintentional subversion of consensus since only about a quarter of editors could effectivley sink all future crat nominations while a proper change in our crat policy would require a significantly stronger consensus. The current consensus is that we should have crats and as long as that's the case we should give the role to the most trusted admins we have such as Jo-Jo. ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 23:04, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support No concerns. That said I do agree with some comments below to the effect that we really aren't shorthanded crats. I'm more interested in and encouraged by the recent uptick in RfAs. -Ad Orientem (talk) 01:37, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Last minute support here as I've been thinking about the opposes. I've appreciated Jo-Jo's desire to articulate the rational behind AfD closes (and willingness to try to work to close difficult discussions). --Enos733 (talk) 06:19, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I always think we need more 'crats. Let's go for it. -- Ϫ 06:52, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
Oppose
- I was being petty, so neutral or disregard or whatever. Doesn't seem like I should be doing a bunch of sentence striking, but you get the idea.Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:00, 29 February 2020 (UTC)"'X' is a POVFORK of 'History of X' So Delete" is something Jo agreed with. Seems so clear to me that I must Oppose. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 09:26, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Peregrine Fisher. Could you help others understand your !vote by explaining it, please? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:56, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Dweller: I suspect that PF is referring to this recent hot potato at AFD/DRV. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 10:11, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Yep. Jo was (is?) going to enforce an AfD close where the closer said "X" was a POVFORK of "The History of X". The only reason to make that decision would be to ignore NOTCENSORED. I always thought NOTCENSORED was bedrock, so I vote that way. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 10:17, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Well, the notion that the subject of "race and intelligence" is not in itself encyclopedic, but we should only cover meta topics around it, such as the history of people discussing that concept, could be argued. And many editors did argue that in the AFD. If twenty editors had made that argument and two opposed, then delete would be a correct outcome. My issue with JJE's draft close was not so much the correctness or otherwise of the POVFORK idea, but that they saw a consensus for it that for me just didn't exist in the discussion, based on the numbers and the strength of arguments actually made. — Amakuru (talk) 10:32, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
Jo was (is?) going to enforce ...
is not a true statement. JJ wasn’t/isn’t going to enforce anything. Just so everyone else knows, what Peregrine has a problem with is that JJ drafted a “delete” close in an AFD where Peregrine voted keep. Levivich (talk) 15:11, 28 February 2020 (UTC)- I think the problem was that @Peregrine Fisher: felt JJE’s judgement or personal bias is of concern when making important decisions, especially considering that a panel of admins closed the article in question as a clear cut keep case. With this in mind the irony here is that most likely you successfully and unfairly made Pegregrine feel like an idiot or guilty to the point that you got them to change their vote to neutral and that your problem is that they originally voted oppose when you voted support for JJE. The admin panel close clearly confirms that Peregrine’s original concerns were valid. It is not easy to oppose a fellow editor, as we all like to get along and be positive, so pressurising via belittling the viewpoint of opposers should not be done lightly. JJE’s wordy monologue of contradictory proposed delete rational, which is obviously tainted by an emotional connection or personal bias to the subject, demonstrates they struggle to set feelings aside when dealing with difficult decisions; compare JJE’s wordy close to the three admins panel concise close as keep where feelings are set aside and competent closers follow policy free of bias and they reach the opposite decision. The consequences of JJE drawing the wrong conclusion and not following policy as a bureaucrat is much more serious. I mean I can with the best of them be wordy too but I am not running to be a bureaucrat. I am not up to the job as a bureaucrat and neither is JJE, nothing personal and no hard feelings.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 02:08, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Yep. Jo was (is?) going to enforce an AfD close where the closer said "X" was a POVFORK of "The History of X". The only reason to make that decision would be to ignore NOTCENSORED. I always thought NOTCENSORED was bedrock, so I vote that way. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 10:17, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Dweller: I suspect that PF is referring to this recent hot potato at AFD/DRV. Cheers — Amakuru (talk) 10:11, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Peregrine Fisher. Could you help others understand your !vote by explaining it, please? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:56, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Per my own and unique interpretation of WP:NOTBURO. There is no obvious, compelling or persuasive need to create more people in a role that has extremely limited scope and has ample members to jump on an RfA within seconds of it expiring. Looks ever so slightly like a hat collecting opportunity, but hey, who am I to say. I've only been here 14 years. Could be a 3rd good Admin. lost, which is where resource is more valuable. Leaky caldron (talk) 12:17, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Maybe a silly question, but how would this cause an admin to be lost? Are you worried the new candidates will spend more time craternizing than admining? Surely if the role is so limited in scope it won't be much of a drain on their time. Reyk YO! 12:25, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- It's a lousy time to claim it's "a role that has extremely limited scope and has ample members to jump on an RfA within seconds of it expiring" - have you looked at the last crat-chat? Johnbod (talk) 15:32, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- All of these cratchat-related RfBs suffer from the same fundamental flaw: they are reqesting a user right that will be used at most two times a year. * Pppery * it has begun... 12:42, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I see absolutely no need for additional bureaucrats beyond the two that are going to pass right now. I’m also not entirely convinced that JJE’s experience with AfD translates well to RfA: there are actually policies to weigh at an AfD. There are none at an RfX, and to be blunt, crats shouldn’t really be exercising much discretion beyond determining who is a troll that can be ignored as compared to a good faith user who worded something in a poor way. RfA is a vote, plain and simple. I don’t want someone with experience closing discussions. I want someone who I am confident will generally follow the numbers and not make up arguments as to why vote X is stronger than vote Y.I don’t think JJE will do that in part of because of his answers to the questions, which discusses an analysis of the conversation that reads like an AfD or RfC closure. That’s not really something we want. The community has consistently insisted that RfX are a discussion not a vote, but really, they’re more like the Iowa caucuses: a vote where you try to convince others to agree with you. Crats should generally be less focused on analyzing arguments for policy and more focused on what the will of the community was by setting the guidelines it has set. JJE is a good admin, but I don’t think their experience lends them to being a good crat. TonyBallioni (talk) 13:26, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- @TonyBallioni: Not trying to change or badger your !vote, but you proposed and supported an expansion of crat responsibilities in the recent Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 Resysop Criteria (2), and here you've written
I see absolutely no need for additional bureaucrats beyond the two that are going to pass right now.
. How do you reconcile seeking an expansion of crat responsibilities while simultaneously limiting the number of new crats who could attend to those expanded, but still voluntary, responsibilities? Levivich [dubious – discuss] 04:37, 6 March 2020 (UTC)- No new responsibilities were added. Crats were charged with fulfilling the community’s resysop policy before, they are still charged with that now. The requirement to think before acting rather than just act is not really much heavy lifting. The wailing and gnashing of teeth by some that bureaucrats are now expected to be mind readers ignores the fact that in the real world, acting and defining what is “reasonable” in a given set of circumstances is the basic legal expectation for living in an English speaking country. All the policy says is that one has to think on Wikipedia using the same standard one is expected to think with in real life. That’s not extra work. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:06, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- Wow you really think thinking is not extra work? That is, the difference between an automatic action and a discretionary action does not require extra effort? What if they have to have a discussion? Surely, making a thoughtful, informed, discretionary decision, involves work? I'm honestly very surprised, I've never heard anyone say that before. But OK, that reconciles it, thanks. Levivich [dubious – discuss] 05:12, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- The policy requires a basic lightweight reasonableness check that you likely perform thousands of times a day without even thinking about it. What you’re describing is not the policy, nor was it what the community asked in that RfC. If it was, the proposal would not have passed. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:25, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- The new proposals that you supported and that passed included
1. Before restoring the administrator flag a bureaucrat should be reasonably convinced that the user has returned to activity or intends to return to activity as an editor.
and3. Should there be doubt concerning the suitability for restoration of Admin permissions, the restoration shall be delayed until sufficient discussion has occurred and a consensus established through a Crat Chat.
Now, a crat chat is definitely extra work, wouldn't you agree? Levivich [dubious – discuss] 05:44, 6 March 2020 (UTC)- No, as that’s what already happened. This simply says if someone objects one bureaucrat can’t act unilaterally. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:58, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
one bureaucrat can't act unilaterally
... meaning we'd need more bureaucrats to weigh in. Q.E.D., Levivich [dubious – discuss] 06:04, 6 March 2020 (UTC)- I think a pool of 19 are perfectly capable of handling it. I don’t think you’re trying to engage in discussion at this point, so I’m not going to respond further. TonyBallioni (talk) 06:41, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- No, as that’s what already happened. This simply says if someone objects one bureaucrat can’t act unilaterally. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:58, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- The new proposals that you supported and that passed included
- The policy requires a basic lightweight reasonableness check that you likely perform thousands of times a day without even thinking about it. What you’re describing is not the policy, nor was it what the community asked in that RfC. If it was, the proposal would not have passed. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:25, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- Wow you really think thinking is not extra work? That is, the difference between an automatic action and a discretionary action does not require extra effort? What if they have to have a discussion? Surely, making a thoughtful, informed, discretionary decision, involves work? I'm honestly very surprised, I've never heard anyone say that before. But OK, that reconciles it, thanks. Levivich [dubious – discuss] 05:12, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- No new responsibilities were added. Crats were charged with fulfilling the community’s resysop policy before, they are still charged with that now. The requirement to think before acting rather than just act is not really much heavy lifting. The wailing and gnashing of teeth by some that bureaucrats are now expected to be mind readers ignores the fact that in the real world, acting and defining what is “reasonable” in a given set of circumstances is the basic legal expectation for living in an English speaking country. All the policy says is that one has to think on Wikipedia using the same standard one is expected to think with in real life. That’s not extra work. TonyBallioni (talk) 05:06, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
- @TonyBallioni: Not trying to change or badger your !vote, but you proposed and supported an expansion of crat responsibilities in the recent Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 Resysop Criteria (2), and here you've written
- Oppose. I'm not sure I've seen longer non answers to questions here before. Calidum 14:55, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose I would like to see more time as a sysop as well as more use of sysop tools. Sorry. Bobherry Talk Edits 15:20, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I'm undecided on this RfB at this moment but how much time as a sysop do you think someone should have? 3.5 years seems like more than enough time to me and I was a little taken aback by this oppose. Primefac had less than two years experience as a sysop when he became the last successful crat and did garner 3 opposes though there seemed to be some sense that 3 years might be long enough which this candidate satisfies. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:01, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I was thinking the same thing as Barkeep49. Jo-Jo's use of the tools can be measured through looking through the logs (namely the deletion, merge, protection, and block logs), but it's also worth noting Jo-Jo's closing of discussions, which often result in "no consensus" and even "keep," can't be easily quantified through the logs. So, I'm not sure how one can say Jo-Jo has no use for the added user right. Doug Mehus T·C 16:15, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- bit of trvia:one doesnt need to be an admin for becoming a crat. In other words, an editor who hasnt even spent any time as a sys-op at all - can run for RfB. —usernamekiran (talk) 18:31, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I was thinking the same thing as Barkeep49. Jo-Jo's use of the tools can be measured through looking through the logs (namely the deletion, merge, protection, and block logs), but it's also worth noting Jo-Jo's closing of discussions, which often result in "no consensus" and even "keep," can't be easily quantified through the logs. So, I'm not sure how one can say Jo-Jo has no use for the added user right. Doug Mehus T·C 16:15, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I'm undecided on this RfB at this moment but how much time as a sysop do you think someone should have? 3.5 years seems like more than enough time to me and I was a little taken aback by this oppose. Primefac had less than two years experience as a sysop when he became the last successful crat and did garner 3 opposes though there seemed to be some sense that 3 years might be long enough which this candidate satisfies. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 16:01, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose per TonyBallioni. Nihlus 22:22, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose per TonyBallioni, and Peregrine Fisher, and Calidum (and both, as of this writing, neutral comments below). There's way too much of a wading-in-with-personal-interpretation angle here. While that is sometimes of value at RfC and XfD (when one really does have policy firmly on the side of one's interpretation), it is not in 'Cratchat. In the case brought up here, it was executed poorly even at AfD and DRV (and it looks like we're in for another round of it). When there's a supervoting concern already in the air, I think Bureaucratship is off the table. I'm actually quite disturbed by Jo Jo Eumerus having drafted a delete close for something that was super-mega-obviously a no consensus at worst (and arguably "a cut-and-dry keep" as PF put it), but again wanting to be on the admin panel that closes the re-discussion of that same article's fate; that's just asking for a second chance to impose one's already-decided delete course. It's especially weird to me when the actually obvious result we should get to is that article and the one it is supposedly a PoV-fork of – the other way around really – being merged and at the shorter title. This is not rocket science, but JJE isn't getting it right in any way.
See, e.g., the tortured reasoning in the fourth paragraph of this Eumerus text-wall over here. (It's another "long non-answer", as Calidum put it. I have a reputation for wordiness, but day-um. Rambling circumlocution isn't a trait we value in 'Crats.) In that material, JJE should have started and just ended with "On balance, it looks like we have a consensus that the topic is notable and that being contentious isn't a reason for deletion". Aside from being buried in a whole page of dithering and hand-waving, it goes off the rails even before the rest of that sentence is complete, wandering into what should be covered where and whether there should be a central article on the topic. The AfD and DRV had nothing to do with which bits need to be in what article, and the core question was whether there are two "central" articles in competition with each other, not whether there should be one at all. So, I try to picture this kind of faulty reasoning, improper understanding of the issues raised, and willingness to wikilawyer for page after page, being be brought to bear in 'Cratchat, and I just have to say "nope". I generally trust JJE as an admin (perhaps less so now when it comes to non-SNOW deletion rationales and their intersection with NPoV policy, though the CSD track record looks better), but the 'Crat role is a very different set of responsibilities and requires a rather dispassionate approach. We don't need 'Crats often, but we need them a certain way when we need them.
— SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:04, 29 February 2020 (UTC) - Oppose per SMcClandlish. My main concern are the past and very recent examples of WP:SUPERVOTE.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 10:30, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose What a shame, three at once, how cool it would have been to support all three. Oh well; per Calidum and SMcCandlish. Happy days, LindsayHello 11:20, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose Per SMcCandlish. That draft delete was baffling. That’s about as clear of a “no consensus” as there’s ever been. Mr Ernie (talk) 12:24, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - JJE is a dedicated Wikipedian doing a great job as an admin, but I feel like a crat should be someone who can wade into contentious areas without generating controversy. As much as I admire their work, I don't feel like JJE has quite the deft touch that I expect of a crat. I think highly of them as a Wikipedian and an admin, but I just can't support here. Sorry. Guettarda (talk) 15:20, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - I don't really like the idea of opposing someone offering to take on a useful administrative function for the community, but my view of the candidate is somewhat negative. I have come across them at DYK where the accuracy of some of their hooks, or their new or expanded articles, has been questioned (I don't intend to dig out the diffs). I found an unwillingness to see things from other points of view or to compromise, and I do not think they are really of a suitable calibre to become a beaurecrat. TonyBallioni makes a better, policy-based argument! Cwmhiraeth (talk) 15:25, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose, per all the above, more or less. JJE, I'm an enthusiastic supporter of your work as an admin, but traditionally, cratship is a very different role and requires a different approach. - Dank (push to talk) 16:41, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - TonyBallioni puts it better than I could. stwalkerster (talk) 22:33, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- I'll join the chorus of editors lauding JJE's contributions and dedication to the project. Nonetheless, just as adminship is not a editing award, neither is RfB a referendum on an admin's accomplishments. I share the concerns of SMcCandlish and TonyBallioni regarding the manner in which JJE approaches and executes difficult decisions. A bureaucrat should be an outstanding communicator whose diction is clear, unequivocal, and as concise as the situation allows. Some of the candidate's XfD closing rationales are so long-winded that they compromise the reader's understanding of why the decision was actually made. Take Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Health of Donald Trump: the bulk of that five-paragraph close is simply a rehash of the discussion that took place. The closing admin doesn't need to enumerate each point made by each editor, only to outline how they arrived at their assessment of consensus. And speaking of consensus, I'm not convinced that gauging consensus was actually a primary objective in that close. JJE expresses that they considered closing the AfD as redirect, which would have been an egregious supervote. It's inappropriate, even at XfD, for the closing admin to micro-analyze the debate so intensely that their personal interpretation of individual exchanges(!) between participants is weighed: "I am interpreting Atsme's comments to bd2412 as being about criticism of the diagnoses...".
Another example is the response to QEDK's question on the Money emoji RfA; after reading that passage multiple times, I still have no idea whether the question was answered – I'm leaning toward no. As near as I can tell, the commentary can be boiled down to there were some supports and some opposes, followed by the verbatim conclusion: "neither a 'consensus' nor a 'no consensus' conclusion would be blatantly wrong". It simply sheds no light on JJE's approach to closing edge-case RfAs. Finally, and perhaps most significantly, I have a big problem with the following: "there has never been a strong consensus that content creation is a requirement for adminship and these point tilt this towards 'yes, there is consensus'." You don't need an official RfC mandate in order to take an objection seriously. If a significant portion of editors say a candidate doesn't have enough content creation to be an admin, then there's your consensus that content creation is a valid objection to be taken into account by the closing bureaucrat(s). With apologies for bluntness, it's a bad idea to promote a bureaucrat at risk of putting their thumb on the scale and then cloaking that act, even unintentionally, in diffuse and bombastic prose. – Juliancolton | Talk 23:31, 1 March 2020 (UTC)- @Juliancolton: forgot to mention this bizarre proposed delete close on a highly contentious article by JJE which a panel of admins determined was actually a keep consensus which they then closed it as. So yes, I share some of your same concerns. JJE does lots of great work including admin work, is a valuable editor but not convinced that JJE is ripe for a bureaucrat hat.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 00:22, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- True, that factored into my initial misgivings about this candidacy, but as it has already been discussed at length I figured I'd focus my commentary on other examples. When I'm forced to oppose a nomination, I try to offer as much new insight as possible. Thanks for the comment. – Juliancolton | Talk 00:29, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- @Juliancolton: forgot to mention this bizarre proposed delete close on a highly contentious article by JJE which a panel of admins determined was actually a keep consensus which they then closed it as. So yes, I share some of your same concerns. JJE does lots of great work including admin work, is a valuable editor but not convinced that JJE is ripe for a bureaucrat hat.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 00:22, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - I'm not really seeing any actual qualifications for cratship, either in the nomination statement, the support votes, or the answers to questions. In fact, Q4 asks for their "skills and experience" which would make them a good crat, and the only things they can claim to bring to the table is being a "newer" editor compared to most crats, and that they have the ability to "summarize arguments", which is literally a baseline consensus-assessing skill from any admin or non-admin who closes discussions. I'm also concerned with Q2, where they say crat chats are decided by headcount. When the community is so divided on something that a specialized "task force" of pre-appointed users needs to convene in a rare meeting to analyze the consensus, and when one user is going to be analyzing the consensus of this group of users, the one thing I don't want to hear coming out of their mouth is "head count". A crat closing a crat chat needs to have an intellectually elevated, rational, nuanced approach to assessing a consensus, strongly rooted in policy and practice, and using a "head count" as the gold standard for doing so is not only straightforwardly disqualifying, but fails even the most basic standards of any newer non-admin who wants to wade into assessing consensus. Anyone who could even possibly post such a thing without seeing what's obviously wrong with it has no place being a crat, and the lame and meaningless statement that "a recent thread says we need more crats" is not an excuse to shoehorn in candidates that don't actually have any real qualifications to be a crat or any notable need or want to take on the role. ~Swarm~ {sting} 06:03, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose for now, with sadness because I highly respect JJE's work. Swarm has summarised my concerns quite well, however I believe in personal development and so trust that one day JJE will make a very good crat. — kashmīrī TALK 19:15, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose/ As per Swarm, SMcCandlish and TonyBallioni. Loopy30 (talk) 02:38, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose as well. Was originally neutral, and didn't initially feel my comment would be necessary, but I share a similar mindset to Swarm, and SMcCandlish's vote also justifies my position here. I think that Jo-Jo Eumerus is a fine admin, but this is not an RfA. Utopes (talk / cont) 05:19, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Per comment in neutral section, I don't think that making JJ a bureaucrat would be a net positive for the encyclopedia. buidhe 02:23, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- I like Jo-Jo and think he's a fine admin, much more so than myself. However, I loathe how, more and more, RFA has to be treated like a "Bureaucrat's suggestion box", where we have to guess at what kind of previously-perfectly-valid rationale to write that won't be arbitrarily dismissed if an RFA ends up within a couple percentage points of the nominal discretionary range. AFD closes aren't a good analogy here. DRV closes, however, are: they're mostly discussions among very experienced users, they have a (very few) hard-and-fast rules about closing that really upset people when they're not followed, and a poor close is not, in general, reversible. Taken in that light, a couple of Jo-Jo's DRV closes (Taylor James is the most recent) are too supervotey for my taste. —Cryptic 16:30, 28 February 2020 (UTC) I'm also moving to oppose, for largely the same reason Juliancolton opposed above. In an AFD, where we have relatively well-settled policy and you might only have two or three experienced editors commenting, it makes sense to look at discussions through the lens of a broader external consensus; but there are no accepted adminship standards with remotely the same support as deletion policy, and RFAs regularly get well over a hundred editors with clue. If these are really discussions and not votes, then the aim of discussing is to convince the other participants, not the closers. When bureaucrats dismiss opposes based on editing experience because "the community has said we need more admins", or based on civility "because the supporters were unconvinced", or - as Jo-Jo wrote he would do in Q10.1 - based on lack of content creation because there isn't "a strong consensus that content creation is a requirement for adminship" (honestly, where do you think such consensuses come from? It's not whoever's been most vocal on WT:RFA for the past couple months), then RFA is no longer a discussion, or even a vote among its participants; it's a vote among bureaucrats. I was initially neutral because, while I didn't think Jo-Jo would make a good crat, I figured he'd at least be better than our current ones. I no longer have such confidence. —Cryptic 03:01, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Strong administrator, but I am persuaded by the opposition that the candidate will bring adventurous views to the bureaucrats' mix. AGK ■ 07:47, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose per Juliancolton and SMcCandlish. A very solid editor and admin, but these don't make one automatically well suited for bureaucratship.--Staberinde (talk) 19:28, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose – the main thing I want to see in a bureaucrat is the ability to take a long and complicated discussion and distill it down to a clear and simple result. – bradv🍁 23:16, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose per Juliancolton. Hrodvarsson (talk) 23:53, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Mild agreement with Cryptic and portions of what TB and JC said. I have additional reservations from some of my own interactions about a tendency toward supervotiness, both from closings and other realms. Some discussions can be a giant mess, and it is sometimes necessary to grapple and wrangle a decision out of them, even if it's no consensus, and I appreciate the difficulty that takes. It's a skill that can be helpful but is only necessary exceptionally rarely and, critically, only because XfDs have multiple possible outcomes. I worry about seeing it RfX, including from some of the above answers. I don't begrudge the wordiness on complex closeness, but do agree that concision is helpful. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 11:14, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - regretfully, as JJE is a thoughtful and experienced admin, I know their heart is in this project, and it's never easy to have to oppose fellow editors when they apply for positions. But I am concerned here largely per the two points Cryptic makes above. Unlike routine admin chores, bureaucratship is almost entirely about reading consensus. As a participant in the recent Race and intelligence DRV, I felt that JJE's preliminary decision (posted here: Wikipedia talk:Deletion review/Log/2020 February 12) represented a misreading of the discussion - it looks like a point that would have been well made as a !vote, but not as a close of the discussion that took place. And I would urge JJE to take on board the points raised above, that some of their closes veer too much towards the WP:SUPERVOTE end of the spectrum. And again per Cryptic, I am concerned about the answer to 10.1, which seems to suggest that certain viewpoints should ipso facto be assigned less weight at RFA. In particular, the view that "there has never been a strong consensus that content creation is a requirement for adminship" should not be one that's ever used in an RFA close. For me and many others, content creation in admins is a big issue and, although there may be circumstances where a relative lack of content can be overcome by other considerations (Money emoji was one such, on the borderline), this view should not be downplayed just because some people don't concur with it. As an aside, I don't agree with some of the opposes above, suggesting that RFAs should be evaluated purely on numbers, that definitely isn't the case - there is a role for crats in determining consensus based on discussion and the community has expressly rejected the "purely-a-vote" idea in RFCs before. — Amakuru (talk) 14:54, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose. Disagree with the premise that "new blood" will improve outcomes. This role is one which calls for the wisdom of long experience. Jonathunder (talk) 19:32, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- Regretful oppose, I don’t like to discourage well-intended volunteering but the opposers have made a compelling case, especially Juliancolton. Gleeanon409 (talk) 23:07, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
Neutral
- Moved to oppose, comment still stands: I have a very high opinion of this editor based on my interaction with them, but I was not impressed by how they handled the Race and intelligence close. It didn't seem that there was any consensus in that discussion. Bureaucrats must be very careful to avoid even the appearance of WP:SUPERVOTE (I am not saying that is what happened in the Race and intelligence close, but some editors perceived it that way). buidhe 15:04, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Moved to oppose. —Cryptic 03:01, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- Neutral, leaning support; I am not as familiar with Jo-Jo as I am the other two RfB candidates, but I'm very concerned that much (not all) of the oppose section is copy-and-pasted boilerplate that has nothing to do with this candidate specifically. And I'm especially disturbed that some are attempting to overturn the community's long-standing and repeatedly confirmed sentiment that RfAs are a discussion (and not merely a vote) by attempting to tank individual RfBs. That's not fair to the candidate, and it's not an appropriate use of the RfB process. 28bytes (talk) 15:16, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- To be fair, your vote was less contextual than most of the opposition, to be specific, your concern had nothing to do with the candidate and your neutral vote has no weight (as you stated about the opposes) wrt consensus around the candidate. Just my 0.02$. --qedk (t 桜 c) 17:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- But it’s also not just a discussion. Probably the most accurate description would be a public vote with a concurrent discussion. The two other RfB candidates clearly understand this and both to one degree or another pay deference to percentage as an indicator of consensus, even within the discretionary zone. This has been a trend in recent crat chats as well, and is a good thing. JJE’s answers suggest they’d approach this more like an AfD, where percentages matter less and arguments more. While the community has been insistent on calling this a discussion, it has also been insistent on maintaining percentages. Focusing too much on the discussion aspect without recognizing in the majority of cases, the numbers matter more, loses sight of that community consensus. Opposing someone because you don’t think they’ll pay enough attention to the numeric guidelines established by the community is fair, just as supporting them because they are good at analyzing discussions is fair: the community’s way of handling consensus at RfA is in tension, and deciding how those discussions are handled is up to bureaucrats. Voting based on how you think the tension should be resolved is appropriate, imo. TonyBallioni (talk) 18:13, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Just want to say that, while I disagree pretty strongly with TonyBallioni on what RfA should be like (i.e., I prefer more of a discussion, less of a vote), his ending assessment of the opposes is correct: I expect bureaucrats to do exactly what the community has decided, no more and no less. It's up to us to change policy, expectations, and practice, but until then, crats must abide, even if they personally disagree. Opposes concerned about adherence to the community's guidelines are doing so perfectly in line with the job description of bureaucrats. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 11:40, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
- A fine sysop, who wades in and makes the difficult calls. We need a dozen more like him. When he picks a side he's almost always on the right one. But... JJE does pick sides. He deserves a truckload of barnstars for doing the job he does, but I'm afraid I think he might be the wrong personality type for a crat.—S Marshall T/C 23:54, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Neutral Clearly Jo Jo is a very good user and admin, and it won't be a travesty if they join the bureaucrat team, but I have a hunch that when two have just been appointed, adding a third into the mix, one a number of users are concerned by, isn't the right decision just yet. Jo Jo's RFB was filed third and last, and I feel like it'd be better to let the others settle in first and see if we even need a third right now. Other users have also raised a number of valid points regarding supervotes. KaisaL (talk) 08:45, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- I have only two reasons for staying neutral: 1) I have only "known" Jo-Jo for about three months, and 2) I really really don't think there was enough discussions about just why we need more 'crats and what flavor of more 'crats we need. I am still wondering why crats weigh in on RFAs and then have to recuse; not enough crats, stop voting in RFAs. Nonetheless. My short experience with Jo-Jo has shown me that he is the kind of candidate I would hands-down enthusiastically support if 1) I had a few more months of observing him enough to know he would stand up to other admins when they are wrong, and 2) if I thought we needed more 'crats now. Jo-Jo is not only a content creator supreme, but has demonstrated to me very high bar for integrity. I hope he comes around again for 'crat when it is more clear just what kind of 'crats we need; I am much more comfortable with someone I know has the integrity to swim against the tide than some other admins, and I believe Jo-Jo would when necessary. Just need more time. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:17, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
General comments
- Sorry if I'm missing something, but what is with all the RfBs recently? Foxnpichu (talk) 11:38, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- The most recent RFA went to a crat chat. The outcome was relatively close for about the first 90% of the time, and then a few late 'crats added their opinions and a decision was made. Multiple people on the crat chat talk page said we needed more crats to avoid a 5-day-long 'crat chat in the future. Primefac (talk) 12:02, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Good luck to the candidates, of course, but only two (including that which recently sparked these noms) have gone over the 100-hour stretch since 2007—indeed, to put it another way, this was the first to go over 100 hours since 2007. The mean duration of a CratChat is ~46 hours. Less than two days, which is probably comforting for those that see a need for the group's augmentation. ——SN54129 14:10, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- The most recent RFA went to a crat chat. The outcome was relatively close for about the first 90% of the time, and then a few late 'crats added their opinions and a decision was made. Multiple people on the crat chat talk page said we needed more crats to avoid a 5-day-long 'crat chat in the future. Primefac (talk) 12:02, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I’ve said something like this on the talk, but I’ll say it here in case this goes to a chat so it’s considered: for everything above RfA or even for global permissions, the size of the group elected is absolutely a valid consideration. As an example, I am strongly of the view that we have too many oversighters and that we should have appointed less in September 2019. I raised this during the consultation and others agreed with it. ArbCom obviously didn’t, but that’s how the process works. Nonetheless, these views were heard and considered as part of that process.As this applies to the RfB: it is the community who decides via RfB how many bureaucrats it wants. There is no other way to limit it, and having a hard policy wouldn’t allow the community flexibility in case there suddenly becomes a great need for crats (unlikely, but who knows.) The point of view of those in the community who feel limiting the size of a group that doesn’t have much to do anymore and considering that point of view is just as important as the point of view that we need new blood.Neither view has any basis in any policy whatsoever. Instead they are members of the community expressing their informed views as to how they see this role going forward in what is functionally the only way to express it. Neither point of view should be dismissed as “weak” since valued and experienced community members hold it on both sides. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:34, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- While "everyone's opinion is equally valid" is a noble ideal, I personally find analysis of a particular candidacy much more useful in that candidate's RfX than copied-and-pasted "too many administrators currently" type comments that do not make any attempt to assess the individual candidate. 28bytes (talk) 01:53, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- And I would add that on the flip side, "we need more 'crats, therefore this person should be a 'crat" is equally as unedifying, albeit less likely to affect the end result since opposes are weighted so much more heavily. 28bytes (talk) 01:57, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- I get your view, but I disagree with it because there is no functional way other than an RfB to limit the number of bureaucrats. If someone thinks that we already have too many and that we shouldn't be expanding it, there's only one place to make that known: an RfB. I don't think any Wikimedia project has a formal policy on max for any role, but seeking to limit user rights above RfA to a reasonable number of people is something that's a topic of conversation on this project and on other projects. Wizardman and Bbb23 both posted at BN recently saying that they both felt that additional bureaucrats would muddy the waters. My personal view is that we should be moving away from crats and getting real RfA reform is going to be difficult when you have inertia caused by a large group of people who, to be honest, don't have much to do but are central to the current system. I'm fine with expanding to fit needs, but overly expanding is not something I personally see as beneficial to the project. Both of these reasons are just as strong as any reason for wanting to create more. TonyBallioni (talk) 02:25, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- And I would add that on the flip side, "we need more 'crats, therefore this person should be a 'crat" is equally as unedifying, albeit less likely to affect the end result since opposes are weighted so much more heavily. 28bytes (talk) 01:57, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- While "everyone's opinion is equally valid" is a noble ideal, I personally find analysis of a particular candidacy much more useful in that candidate's RfX than copied-and-pasted "too many administrators currently" type comments that do not make any attempt to assess the individual candidate. 28bytes (talk) 01:53, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- I find myself puzzled at the way TonyBallioni justifies their vote, with a repeated emphasis on a rigid numerical threshold for RfA without any room for interpreting Wikipedia's policies. Airbornemihir (talk) 05:15, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- This is going to a bureaucrat discussion, right? Airbornemihir (talk) 18:17, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
- I'm always curious why people who oppose and say "we don't need more 'crats" draw flak while in every RFA there will be multiple supports saying we need more admins. Should we ignore those votes? Calidum 21:35, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- I very much doubt an active administrative corps ten times its current size would ever run out of work. The bureaucrat-specific backlogs, in contrast, are basically nonexistent. There's a lot of support rationales at RFA that could stand to be discounted a whole lot more than the crats have been willing to do, but this isn't one of them. —Cryptic 23:45, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- I encourage participants to reaffirm their votes since a lot of crats take that into account while assessing consensus and to do away with the whole "the people who voted earlier did not know that!" (pure hog-wash, I believe) that comes up occasionally. You can also state your willingness towards a crat chat (this is for the opposition mostly), or not, if that's your viewpoint. That should make things in the crat chat (if need arises) much easier to assess imo. Best, --qedk (t 桜 c) 16:51, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- The above bureaucratship discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
- The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for bureaucratship. Please do not modify it.
WereSpielChequers
Final (161/14/2); Closed as successful by Useight (talk) at 17:57, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
Self Nomination
WereSpielChequers (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) – I have been a Wikipedian for more than twelve years now, and an admin for over a decade. My main focus has been in the mainspace, fixing the sort of typos that a conventional spellchecker would not pick up. But I have also done a few thousand logged admin actions. I have been involved in the GLAM program, including two years as WMUK's GLAM Organiser (2013/15). I have reviewed articles at FAC and written for the Signpost, for example this article announced the end of the 2007-2014 decline in editing stats, and this article covered the death anomalies project (currently on hold until a new bot writer comes forward) .
Various other accounts are listed on my userpage, including ones such as my WMUK one that have now been inactive for several years.
While this is a self nomination, it was made with some encouragement on my talkpage ϢereSpielChequers 17:35, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Questions for the candidate
Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as a bureaucrat. You may wish to answer the following optional questions to provide guidance for participants:
- 1. Have you read the discussions on when to promote and not promote? What do you understand the criteria for promotion to be?
- A: I have voted in many RFAs and watched many Crat Chats, even commenting sometimes on the talkpage. I'm familiar with the process, understand that the discretionary zone is now 65-75%, and am aware that it is a discussion rather than a vote.
- 2. How would you deal with contentious nominations where a decision to promote or not promote might be criticized?
- A: Nowadays there seems to be a presumption in favour of crat chats for RFAs in the discretionary zone. I certainly won't be closing such contentious RFAs - my aim as a new Crat would be to take part in the crat chat, and it would be a long while before I closed a Crat chat. That wouldn't stop me closing an RFA that was clearly outside of the discretionary zone, but the nearest I would do to a bold Crat move would be to close as unsuccessful the RFA which was in freefall having gone from 96% support to 76% support over the last 24 hours since new evidence emerged and was conceded.....
- 3. Wikipedians expect bureaucrats to adhere to high standards of fairness, knowledge of policy and the ability to engage others in the community. Why do you feel you meet those standards?
- A: I have been active, including at RFA for a very long time. I started Wikipedia:RFA_by_month many years ago when I was trying to prove that RFA was in a drought rather than a cyclical downturn. I could understand someone looking at me ten years ago, possibly only five years ago and thinking that I wouldn't be a fair person to be a crat as I clearly worried too much about declining RFA numbers and our declining numbers of admins. But my thinking has changed over the years, I have come to realise that many of the people who I have offered to nominate for RFA really are happy for others to have those buttons. More importantly the decline in new adminships that followed the unbundling of Rollback in 2008 has been mirrored by a huge increase in the number of Rollbackers - we now have far more Rollbackers than we have ever had admins. In short, whilst I still believe that there are many Wikipedians who would sail through RFA if we could tempt them to run, I believe I can be trusted to treat RFA candidates fairly as a crat (or of course vote in the RFA and recuse from any crat chat where I don't feel neutral about a candidate).
- Additional question from Barkeep49
- 4. What do you make of the overlap in membership between Arbitrators and Bureaucrats? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 18:05, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: As far as I'm aware there isn't much overlap between those two, and I certainly don't plan to increase it myself. However I'm not too bothered if there is some overlap, provided the people who wear both hats don't get involved in the same case as both an arb and a crat.
;Additional question from King of Scorpions
5. What would your decision have been in the Money emoji bureaucrat chat? Ping me when you reply, King of Scorpions 18:15, 25 February 2020 (UTC)Changing question per candidate's request. King of Scorpions 18:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)- A:Hi King of Scorpions would you mind giving me a hypothetical example rather than such a close recent one? I would feel uncomfortable weighing in on someone who has been involved in such a close call - especially as they are only just out from spending a fortnight under the spotlight.
- Additional question from Wugapodes
- 5. Do bureaucrats have the same or less latitude to act under WP:IAR than non-bureaucrats? In what situations, if any, should a bureaucrat take actions contrary to a policy?
- A: I can't remember when I last relied on WP:IAR in making a decision. Crats should be more cautious than others in invoking IAR. Generally there will be two elements in play when a Crat should breach a policy - different policies conflicting with each other and either urgency or a consensus to act. That said I can think of one occasion where I did invoke IAR. Two editors were in a slowburn edit war as to what the subject should be of a particular page. Rather than hand out warnings for edit warring, or try to work out which was originally the subject of the article, I deleted the whole thing, restored all the edits about one subject and then moved that to a page on that subject. Restored the remaining edits and moved them to a page about the other subject, and then turned the battleground page into a disambiguation page for the two.
- Additional question from King of Scorpions
- 6. A user runs through an RFA. The tally after one week is 65%. However, half of the opposes were pile-ons for an issue raised from 3 years ago that is no longer relevant. When this hypothetical RFA goes to the bureaucrat chat, what would your decision be? Ping me in reply, King of Scorpions 18:52, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Hi King of Scorpions it isn't up to the Crats whether an incident from over three years ago is no longer relevant. If I think that it is and lots disagree then it would be best for me to vote in the RFA and recuse from the Crat chat. So lets assume that I am not convinced that the issue is no longer relevant, so I haven't !voted and I am participating in the crat chat. 65% is at the very bottom of the discretionary range, so in my view it needs a stronger case to go against the raw numbers than if it was at the top of the range. But lets add to your hypothetical - how do the "weak" votes break? Lots of opposes saying "weak because it was three years ago" could move me in one direction, equally it could push me in the other direction if lots of the supports are saying things like "weak, because of the incident from three years ago, but kudos for staying with the same username". Equally, though oppose reasons are generally considered cumulative, if lots of the opposes for other reasons are saying "Oppose per User X. But I'm not bothered about the editwarring block from three years ago. Seriously three years without editwarring means we can count that block as no longer relevant". Trend can also be important. If the three year old incident only emerged 30 hours from the end and the support level has been dropping 1% an hour then I'm much more minded to support closing as no consensus than if the RFA took a nose dive after the three year old incident emerged, but the support level has been rising steadily for the last 24 hours after people started to argue that it was no longer relevant, and that the recent supposedly overhasty deletion tag that made the three year old incident relevant was for tagging a page for deletion that consisted solely of the phrase "poop on wheels" and therefore the three year old incident is no longer relevant.
- Single question from MJL
- 7. Should content creation be a deciding factor in evaulating the outcome of RFAs? –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 19:34, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Yes. Content creation has been one of the deciding factors at RFA for about twelve years now, ever since the unbundling or Rollback in early 2008. Before then people often passed RFA simply on the basis of being "good vandalfighters", but for about twelve years now there has been an expectation at RFA that a candidate needs to have helped build the pedia, not just defend it. How much content contributions are required is often the main issue of disagreement in RFAs. My view is that an admin needs to have added reliably sourced info to the pedia - I think I am in line with longstanding consensus on this. There are !voters out there who are stricter than me, expecting a new admin to have written a GA or an FA. Currently there would need to be other reasons for an RFA to fail if a candidate lacked a GA. Of course that consensus could change, but it is a very longstanding one. However there is a difference here between my past role as a nominator and the role I am currently applying for. As a nominator I would only nominate someone if I thought they met that longstanding consensus. If I become a crat I would be looking at the consensus in the discussion, including the possibility that it might shift or that the community might decide to make an exception.
- Additional question from Pharaoh of the Wizards
- 8. Do you think this question "Have you edited under previous account" asked in several RFA as it appears by some editors as it appears to than that the candidate fails WP:DUCK is appropriate in the context of this Wikipedia:Clean start#Requests for adminship says candidates are not obliged to publicly disclose previous accounts.
- A: There appears to be some policy tension there, but I don't know if there was something about the candidate that reminded the person who asked the question of some contentious departed editor. As a nominator I always discuss this with my nominees and I can't see myself nominating someone with a former account unless they were prepared to say something like "I have not edited under any other account in the last five years". As an editor I would support a change to the policy on this to introduce some sort of statute of limitations, instead of the current You are not obliged to reveal previous accounts; however, it is strongly recommended that you inform the Arbitration Committee (in strictest confidence if you wish) of the existence of a previous account or accounts prior to seeking adminship or similar functionary positions. Perhaps You must disclose in an RFA the identity of any account you have edited with in the last five years. Any account you have edited with in the last ten years you may disclose to ARBCOM instead of in the RFA. Though I doubt anyone would lose votes in an RFA if they said they had had an account over ten years ago that they weren't going to disclose. However as a Crat I would merely weigh the consensus that emerged in the RFA.
- 8A. Do you think Candidates should disclose whether they had a previous account in a RFA (without the naming the account).Particurly for those making there clean start after conflict rather than privacy reasons.
- A: Yes, and I won't nominate someone unless they are willing to at least say "I haven't edited with any other accounts in the last five years". Note however that you said should not must. Sooner or later we will have another of those RFAs where it emerges during the RFA that the candidate had an undisclosed prior account, and as a crat I would seek to weigh the consensus that emerged from that revelation.
- 9. Do Crats have the right to use there discretion rather WP:IAR in there decision making or have to compulsory follow policy in each and very decision ?
- A: Crats have a lot of discretion, including a whole zone of it at RFA. But that is balanced by us picking Crats who will use their discretion as a Crat on behalf of the community. There will be occasions where I know an RFA candidate from the London meetup or elsewhere and want to support or indeed oppose them regardless of the normal RFA standards; but the way to do that is for me to !vote in the RFA and then recuse in any Cratchat
- Additional questions from QEDK
- 10. Are trendlines indicators of consensus in RfAs, do you consider them to be a viable method of gauging consensus (for example, in crat chats)?
- A: There is an argument that RFA is a seven day process and if the last five days has a uniform gentle downwards trend one shouldn't extrapolate because everyone who took part in the RFA had plenty of time to reassess their position based on whatever started that trendline. Conversely if a trendline starts in the last day or so and people are shifting position in droves with the support percentage dropping at 1% an hour then of course Crats should pay attention to it. Somewhere in between the two will be the one that makes for a really interesting cratchat.
- 11. If you were a crat, how would you assess Money emoji's RfA?
- A: As I said in my answer to Q5, Would you mind giving me a hypothetical example rather than such a close recent one? I would feel uncomfortable weighing in on someone who has been involved in such a close call - especially as they are only just out from spending a fortnight under the spotlight.
- @WereSpielChequers: I do not intend to change my question, but if you choose to not answer, that's up to you. --qedk (t 桜 c) 16:07, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: As I said in my answer to Q5, Would you mind giving me a hypothetical example rather than such a close recent one? I would feel uncomfortable weighing in on someone who has been involved in such a close call - especially as they are only just out from spending a fortnight under the spotlight.
- Additional question from Nihlus
- 12. How would you have determined consensus during the RexxS and Jbhunley bureaucrat discussions?
- A: I !voted in both of those, and one of those editors is someone is on my recall list, so obviously I would have recused in their case. If I had been a crat at the time I might not have !voted in the other and instead taken part in the crat chat. But as with two previous questions, I'm a bit uncomfortable talking about a fellow Wikipedian in this way, especially as one of them has not been around for a few weeks. Would you mind giving me a hypothetical question instead?
- Additional question from Bilorv
- 13. A bit of a rhetorical question: do you have a strong password? And have you ever used the password on a different website? (If your answers aren't "definitely and never", go change the password and then reply "definitely and never".)
- A: definitely and never. I used to work in IT and for a couple of years around the time I became a Wikipedian I worked closely with my then employer's security team. So I have been using strong passwords for a long time.
- Additional question from Tymon.r
- 14. The community has once decided to lower the discretionary range for RfA closures to 65-75% (of support). Do you believe it was a good decision? Should it be lowered even further (e.g. per WP:!VOTE) to let 'crats evaluate consensus and arguments in more cases?
- A: Re your first question: I seem to remember supporting that change and subsequently defending it in various discussions at WT:RFA. Of course the role of crats is to apply policy not to make it, and one of the reasons why I am now going for RFB is that while I used to be someone who wanted to make quite a few changes at RFA I am now fairly comfortable with current policy re RFA. Re your second question: I'm not convinced that lowering the discretionary band further would actually result in more case where Crats had discretion. It wouldn't greatly increase the number of successful RFAs either. RFA results are almost the opposite of a bell shaped curve - most RFAs are very clear passes or very clear fails. So lowering the discretionary band from 65-75% to say 55-65% wouldn't necessarily increase the number of RFAs that ended in the discretionary band, it would of course increase the number of passes, but not by much, and though my own first RFA ended at about 60%, I'm not convinced that it would be a good idea to lower the discretionary band. Morestothe point, it isn't up to crats to decide on where the discretionary band should be, the role of crats is to work within the policies that the community has decided on.
- 15. Have you ever made a mistake while evaluating community consensus? If yes, what was it or what was the most serious one? Should a 'crat revert a blatantly wrong decision of another 'crat?
- A: Re your first question, not that I can remember. Re the second one n/a, Re the third, that depends on whether it is a crat making a crat decision, or a crat making a non crat decision, and if so whether it is urgent. A crat making a non crat decision BRD applies it is entirely possible that I might revert a bold article edit by a fellow crat and then take things to the talkpage. If a Crat makes what I think is a wrong decision with the Crat tools then I would probably go to the Bureaucrats noticeboard or their talkpage unless it was very urgent or very blatant. That said if someone does manage to close an RFA and accidentally give the admin bits to the nominator and not the candidate, I would take the admin bits off the nominator as soon as they pointed out the problem to me..
- Additional question from Trialpears
- 16. Crats have the ability to grant interface administrator rights and thus have all the same security risks as an interface administrator. All users with interface administrator access are required to use two-factor authentication (2FA) due to security risks involved with the permission. Would you be willing to enable 2FA to minimize said risks?
- A: I've looked at 2FA and might well move to it. But not while I'm dithering between whether I upgrade my Windows box, revert to Lynux or shift to the Mac I recently used for a fortnight.
- Additional question from Newslinger
- 17. Which one (or more) of your discussion closures best illustrates your approach to assessing consensus?
- A: Though I have made several thousand logged admin actions, I'm not a big one for closing - hence my earlier commitment that my aim was to participate in Crat chats rather than close them. I would of course also be available for the uncontentious flipping of bits that takes place with retirements etc, and to close unambiguously successful RFAs. But to illustrate my approach to judging consensus at RFA, I understand that self declared "weak" !votes can be given less weight, whilst "strong votes" are a sometimes successful attempt to influence the discussion and not something to reduce or even increase the weight of that !vote when evaluating consensus. I think I have already covered trends, I would not take them into account unless very steep and late, so steep and late that it is clear that !voters are shifting their position as fast as they come back to the RFA. When it comes to !votes without rationales I assume they are in agreement with the argument above them, in the case of supporters that usually means the nomination, in the case of opposers it means earlier opposes. Which begs the question of how to tell the difference between a first oppose that is just someone with a grudge against the candidate and someone who spotted the valid oppose reasons that later opposes spelled out.
- Additional question from InvalidOS
- 18. A BRfA is open for a bot that will automatically delete pages that are tagged for deletion under CSD U1. Would you accept or deny this bot?
- A: I'm not intending to get involved at Bot requests in the immediate future, but I have been involved in past discussions re a U1 bot. As I remember it we got consensus for a bot that would delete U1 requests but couldn't find a volunteer to code, test and run such a bot. There were some obvious safeguards in place, as I remember it the page had to be in userspace, the U1 tag had to be added by the person whose userspace it was in and the page had to have never been moved. Otherwise the potential for vandals would have been ginormous. So some U1s would still have needed an admin to handle them, but most would be usefully automated.
- Additional question from Amorymeltzer
- 19. You probably spent more time thinking about RfA a decade ago than anyone else since. Reading over your talkpage comments leading up to this request, I'm wondering how you feel that could or would inform your behavior as a bureaucrat? Is there a role at RfA for bureaucrats beyond closing? To be clear, I'm not asking or suggesting you'd close differently based on your views, but rather, to give some examples, whether bureaucrats have a role in improving the RfA process or tone, or whether that even needs to be done, and how your experience might inform answers to those kind of questions. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:35, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: There is an important distinction between changing policy and applying policy, and one reason why I'm now willing to run for crat is that I broadly agree with RFA policy, sufficiently that I would work within current policy as a crat, and not be acting as crat when supporting a change in policy, that said RFA is still a pretty toxic place at times, and I think that those who want to make it less toxic, whether we are crats, nominators, candidates or !voters, have an opportunity to do so. One of my beefs is that we don't have an agreed criteria at RFA, and a common source of uncomfortable behaviour at RFA ia over where the defacto criteria should be. Experiencd nominators have an important role here, not just in guiding candidates to display the qualities that will pass RFA, but in the unsung and often very confidential emails that dissuade people from running until they meet certain criteria. I would like some of the anomalies to be settled by abstract discussion rather than endlessly partially rehashed by arguments in marginal or near marginal RFAs. For example there is precedent that longstanding members of the community are cut some extra slack by crats, I don't dispute the precedent, but im not convinced that that precedent has consensus. Back to the crats, some frank advice in closing statements, especially those that are unsuccessful might be helpful - in the past we have lost too many of our unsuccessful RFA candidates, even the ones where the opposers were clear as to what the candidate would have to do to pass next time. I don't know how many of the crats had an unsuccessful first RFA, but my first RFA was far more memorable to me than my more recent successful one, and I think that would give me an interesting, probably unusual perspective among crats. More broadly, there is a clerking role to take on, including sometimes explaining to !voters that the evidence they are using doesn't mean what they think it means.
- Additional question from Leaky
- 20. Please describe 2 examples of conflicts of interest which would cause you not to participate in a 'crat. decision or discussion.
- A: It is more than four years since I ceased to be a Wikimedia UK employee, so I'm not sure I have any conflicts of interest re people I know to be editors on Wikipedia. But there are two groups of people where I would of course recuse from a crat chat. Those where a reasonable person would assume I was not neutral - regulars at the London meetup, RFA candidates where I had voted in the RFA; and the second group would be people where I considered myself not to be neutral. Friends, people with whom I have had extensive off wiki conversations especially about their possible RFA. In most circumstances these are people whose RFAs I would participate in anyway, but it is entirely possible that I could take a week off and come back to find a crat chat had opened on such a person's RFA.
- Additional question from Robert McClenon
- 21. What other functions besides Crat Chats on RFA candidates do bureaucrats have? Please explain as appropriate. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:06, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Crats close successful RFAs and RFBs and set the admin and crat flags. They also handle retirements and returns of admins and crats in accordance with policy, and similarly the setting and unsetting of bot and interface administrator rights in accordance with the relevant policies. I have long experience of setting various user rights such as rollback and autopatroller in accordance with various policies - 439 of my admin actions have been the setting and unsetting of userrights so i consider myself qualified to help out there.
- Additional question from Hawkeye7
- 22. Since you like hypotheticals, I will give you one. An admin interferes with a controversial software rollout and is summarily desysopped by WMF as an office action. The ex-admin then applies to be re-sysopped on the WP:BN. Which of out policies and guidelines apply in this case? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:36, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: We don't reverse office actions, even if we consider them wrong, not unless we are prepared to be desyopped. Nor do we resysop those who were desysopped "under a cloud". So even if I were intending to vote "strong support" as soon as the RFA went live, I wouldn't support resysopping via the bureaucrats noticeboard. At least not without the WMF conceding something along the lines of "sorry guys, yes the white font on white text display on all windows devices was something we should have fixed before the rollout, if you agree to unban all accounts ending (WMF) we agree to return to the status quo ante".
- Additional question from Levivich
- 23. In fairness, you asked for hypotheticals multiple times, so now your eager colleagues will bury you in hypotheticals. Here's mine:
If a train traveling 200mph leaves New York at noon headed for Washington, and a second train leaves Philadelphia at 1:30pmHow would you close the following hypothetical RFA (not expecting a full closing statement, just a brief summary of how you'd approach weighing the various categories of !votes and whether you'd find consensus to promote):- 200 !voters total
- 130 support !votes
- 40 "per nom", "no concerns", "no big deal", or similar
- 40 "strong support" with a detailed rationale and/or re-affirming support after reviewing opposes
- 40 "weak support" agreeing with one or more oppose rationales
- 9 "per others", evenly split amongst #1-3
- 1 just a signature
- 70 oppose !votes
- 20 citing lack of content creation
- 20 citing a 3RR block from one year ago
- 20 citing an interpretation of the candidate's username
- 9 "per others", evenly split amongst #1-3
- 1 vote from an account with 11 edits (not blocked)
- Thanks in advance, Levivich (talk) 06:31, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: At first glance that looks to me as "No Consensus", though close as 65% support is at the base of the discretionary zone. So I would open a Crat chat saying that I'm inclined towards No Consensus because the support includes so many "weak" votes, but I'd like to hear from others. I might shift my position subsequently if someone else points out that I clearly hadn't noticed a more than balancing plethora of Weak opposes, or that it had gone from 55% support less than 24 hours earlier when the candidate had announced their intention to rename their account. I see "strong votes" as an attempt, sometimes successful, to influence fellow !voters, but not something to pay any extra heed to in closing, the reaffirming after reviewing opposes is different, especially if there had been a new revelation late in the RFA and some were reaffirming as well as some striking support. In this case with 20 citing a lack of content contributions I would be prepared to downweight that if the reaffirming supporters were pointing to the candidate's FA and the only response to that from the opposers were from people striking oppose or saying "yes, but can they make the username less anatomical or at least drop the rancid bit?". One year is kind of on the cusp for a 3RR block, and unless people had cited more recent diffs with the comment "and you were lucky not to get another £RR block two months ago for this one" I'd expect to see some statements such as "go another 6 months without edit warring and I'd be happy to reconsider" among the opposes per the block. If so I would highlight that in my crat chat comment. The just a signature and the newbie I would not discount, especially as it was only one newbie. The only time I would discount just a signature would be if it was the first oppose as you then have no way of knowing what their oppose argument is. I have seen it argued that the whole discretionary zone is an area where candidates have a presumption of passing unless there is a good reason, I think of it more as 70% being the pass mark, and that Crats have a lot of discretion to weigh consensus for candidates within 5% of that and in rare circumstances beyond that. In this case it is at the bottom of the discretionary zone and the plethora of weak supports take it further away from that. So a Cratchat, but with me in the no consensus camp
- Additional questions from Barkeep49
I've done two questions already. If you decline to answer these two, as 2 is our standard at RfAs, I will not hold it against you. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:38, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- 24. Some crats have express discomfort with the outcome of Wikipedia:Requests for comment/2019 Resysop Criteria (2) on procedural grounds. What are your thoughts about the community adding responsibilities to the scope of bureaucrats? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:38, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: I am OK with the idea of the community coming up with other things for only crats to do, with the obvious but probably superfluous caveat that as crats are volunteers, if you add a task that the current crats don't fancy you might need extra crats. As regards that RFC, here are some issues that I think might be interesting Before restoring the administrator flag a bureaucrat should be reasonably convinced that the user has returned to activity or intends to return to activity as an editor. As far as the intends bit is concerned it is difficult to know what someone intends to do other than what they tell us. Currently a returnee has to at least come back, log in and request the return of the tools, I struggle to think of a likely scenario where we know someone intends to come back before they have. Returns to activity is also vague, especially on a site that counts five edits a month as "active", I expect the crats will wind up with some rule of thumb that equates to a few hours a month, but I can understand if crats baulk at the imprecision of the change. The most important thing in this age of account hacking is whether it is the user returning or someone else who has usurped that account.
Should there be doubt concerning the suitability for restoration of Admin permissions, the restoration shall be delayed until sufficient discussion has occurred and a consensus established through a Crat Chat. There seems to be no minimum level of doubt defined here. I'd hope that we'd get to an arrangement where anyone saying "well I doubt you are the same person" would have to at least convince a crat that there was some doubt, and then that crat would trigger a crat chat. Implicit in these two statements is that if an account has been inactive for years it may not be the same person in charge of that account, and if it is the same person they may have dementia or some other change that makes them unsuitable for returning to adminship (Unless they find a cure for dementia there is reason to believe that a substantial proportion of our admin cadre will experience a bout of dementia before this century is out). I believe there are tools that analyse people's word usage and similar ways to spot that someone is a rusty Wikipedian. I also expect that we will have instances where other Wikipedians can vouch for them - returning to a meetup for the first time in years or having been continually active in another WMF wiki for the intervening years.
- 25. Can you speak to the criteria/philosophy you would use when evaluating
Before restoring the administrator flag a bureaucrat should be reasonably convinced that the user has returned to activity or intends to return to activity as an editor
? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:38, 29 February 2020 (UTC)- A: I think I have covered this somewhat in the previous question. As well as the clearcut criteria as to whether they left under a cloud and how long they were gone for, I'm conscious that there needs to be a sufficient involvement for someone to be aware of what is going on, maybe not the level of activity needed to pass an RFA, but I don't see myself re-sysopping someone who had spent several years editing for an hour every couple of months, and now after a break of a few years promised to return to that level of involvement. I'd be minded to ask what they had done to catch up on the changes to adminship since they had last been an active admin and whether they intended to stay abreast of such changes. However, if a consensus criteria emerges as to what commitment we seek from returning admins then i won't go against that criteria.
Discussion
- Links for WereSpielChequers: WereSpielChequers (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
- Edit summary usage for WereSpielChequers can be found here.
Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review their contributions before commenting.
Support
- Of course, unreservedly! Johnbod (talk) 17:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Yes. Money emoji💵Talk💸Help out at CCI! 18:04, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- H'mmm...still owes me a pint, I seem to remember :p (but also per my prematurity I guess!) ——SN54129 18:17, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Yay random splurge of uncontroversial RfBs! Steel1943 (talk) 18:21, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Still a bit of a newbie, but I'm willing to take a chance on them. Guettarda (talk) 18:22, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- YES I've been waiting for this for years. WSC didn't note this in their nomination statement, but they are also the person behind Wikipedia:RFA by month. WSC is also in the top 5 of contributors to WT:RFA, and as been deeply involved in the RFA process for many, many years. I unreservedly support this candidacy for bureaucrat. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:25, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support WSC is cool, level-headed, and mature. Perfect for a 'crat. I also support the self-nom when it comes to 'crats. I hope that some other wise and tenured admins take it upon themselves to self-nom for 'crat soon...we are dreadfully short. CaptainEek Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 18:26, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I asked WSC to stand (numerous times I believe), and have no reservations supporting. More if necessary. –xenotalk 18:27, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Trusted and vastly experienced editor who will do the job well. Valenciano (talk) 18:28, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - yay! Atsme Talk 📧 18:35, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. If there is such a thing as an "RfA expert", WSC would be a strong contender for the title, with his thoughtful analysis over the years of the process and results. A great fit for this role. 28bytes (talk) 18:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support absolutely, unequivocally. 78.26 (spin me / revolutions) 18:49, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I know WereSpielCheckers from the pub meetups and his encyclopedic knowledge of RFA statistics, including trends over the years and knowledge of what the community has looked for in candidates over those years, make him probably the best-possible candidate for this role. Good luck to you! — Amakuru (talk) 19:01, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Widr (talk) 19:06, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Please! Puddleglum2.0 19:10, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - glad to get this RFB redlink off my watchlist after years of waiting. There are others! Cabayi (talk) 19:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, always helpful and professional towards others. Flibirigit (talk) 19:14, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - trustworthy admin. PhilKnight (talk) 19:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Looks good to me.--MONGO (talk) 19:28, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support even though he has been an admin for only 12 years. Newby! --rogerd (talk) 19:31, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Competent and trusted admin, I see no red flags here. –Davey2010Talk 19:41, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Excellent editor, helpful and thoughtful. - SchroCat (talk) 19:47, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support will be a net-positive to the project. The idea that more users in a the 'crat role is a bad thing is silly. If anything, adding more takes away from the exclusivity of the user right, and thus its perceived importance. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 19:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Why not? Seriously, though, I think WSC would be a great crat. epicgenius (talk) 20:02, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support per my comments to this user in 2019: "The no-need argument is rot. We don't need a lot of help pushing buttons. We do need a group of active Crats who will speak up with their (policy-informed) views in Cratchats (and to a lesser extent at BN etc), particularly the difficult ones. The history of Cratchats shows that a good argument can sway our opinions ... I think you'd make a fine addition to our ranks." The recent Cratchat proved that we're short of active Crats. Come on board. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 20:04, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. MER-C 20:09, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Very happy to back this candidate. Mccapra (talk) 20:17, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support--Ymblanter (talk) 20:21, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support I've thought that SpielChequers should've been a 'cat for a while now. Highly competent. --TheSandDoctor Talk 20:35, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- TonyBallioni (talk) 20:35, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- You have my support. Clovermoss (talk) 20:54, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I don't know the last time we had the opportunity to comment on two RfBs in one day; what excitement! Obvious support. Happy days, LindsayHello 20:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Hell, yes! Gog the Mild (talk) 21:00, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support trustworthy admin. Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 21:14, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I trust the candidate, and their answer to Q5 reassures me that my trust is well placed. Circumspect, but not shackled to bureaucracy. — Wug·a·po·des 21:19, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. No qualms. Cbl62 (talk) 22:15, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Yep--v/r - TP 22:33, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 22:39, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I've met him. He's a good guy. Daniel Case (talk) 22:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- support KylieTastic (talk) 22:52, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support To quote TonyBallioni, "Not a jerk, has a clue." OhKayeSierra (talk) 22:53, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Weak Support due to some issues raised by opposers, but otherwise a good candidate. Foxnpichu (talk) 22:56, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Thoughtful and experienced. MichaelMaggs (talk) 23:27, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support An incredibly safe pair of hands. DBaK (talk) 23:34, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Generally seems suitable for the job. Brustopher (talk) 23:43, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Even if it’s only occasionally having extra reasonable voices for crat chats when they happen from a strong candidate is a good thing. PaleAqua (talk) 00:32, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I have not interacted with this user before, so I wanted to give WereSpielChequers the toughest question I could think of at the time. The answer was well-thought out and balanced. @Dmehus: per your ref of my question. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 02:30, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per the candidate's responses, and per @Serial Number 54129, Atsme, Ymblanter, Amakuru, and MJL:. The fact that the candidate is supported by five of the editors with whom I hold in high regard is good enough for me. So, I'm happy to support with the only caveat being that the candidate now owes Serial Number 54129 two pints. ;-) Doug Mehus T·C 02:35, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support trustworthy, credible, capable. It's true that crats don't have much use for the userright anymore, but our requests for adminship aren't going to close themselves (unless we make them a straight vote). We seldom replenish our roster of crats with fresh blood; now is a good time to do so. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 03:56, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Has earned my respect in our interactions. Never any drama. — BillHPike (talk, contribs) 04:01, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support No concerns. It's about time! Royalbroil 04:10, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, first because this administrator is an excellent candidate for the slightly shinier mop, and second because it is good for the project to inject fresh blood into positions such as these, even if we are perceived to have enough officeholders to perform the function. BD2412 T 04:17, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Weak Support. Not one, but two RfBs in a short time? My support is weak due to the fact that I seriously have never encountered this user on this site to see how they respond to various issues in real time (which may or may not be surprising), and the 3% of edits in Wikipedia space is a bit of a turn off for me. I would personally say that a bureaucrat is somebody that the community to look up, and while I do believe that this user makes quality edits and has been a successful admin, I would rather that the candidate have more of a presence in the Wikipedia namespace with other active editors. With all of that being said, I don't have any particular problems with this user's edits, and my slight grievances were not a reason to oppose this candidate. Regardless, I give my support. Utopes (talk / cont) 04:17, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per Hammersoft (talk), xenotalk, Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned!, 28bytes (talk) and LEPRICAVARK (talk), in particular. If memory serves me correctly, as few as four crat chat votes have been enough to decide an RFA. A few more, especially in view of last year's net loss of three bureaucrats, would be helpful. WereSpielCheckers has been a fine administrator and has great familiarity with and participation in RFAs. Donner60 (talk) 04:37, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per my review. Lourdes 04:41, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Helpful and experienced. My interactions with them has always been positive. Rehman 05:46, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support --I am One of Many (talk) 06:37, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Why not? -FASTILY 06:53, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I have no reservations after seeing the above comments about this candidate. Thank you for running! You're a good choice. PI Ellsworth ed. put'r there 07:44, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Unreservedly. Extremely thoughtful and qualified candidate. – Ammarpad (talk) 08:57, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Nice one. Any more people willing to step up? SilkTork (talk) 09:27, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support WereSpielChequers has done more to document and analyse the RfA process than just about anyone else. If I had to trust one editor to close a contentious RfA, it would be him, and I have had numerous fruitful real-life conversations about what we can do about the RfA process. The opposes all sound like disrupting Wikipedia to illustrate a point and should be ignored by the closing 'crat as completely irrelevant to whether we trust WSC as an individual to carry out 'crat duties. A corpus of 'crats who have had the bits for over ten years could do with some diversity. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 11:14, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Clearly level-headed and some great answers, thus far. Full confidence. Nick Moyes (talk) 11:38, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I have known WSC for a number of years, first through London Wikipedia meetups and then at various admin forums on the English Wikipedia. I trust that he can be a calm and neutral arbiter on any dispute we throw at him while being a responsible specialist button-presser. In other words, he will be a good bureaucrat. Deryck C. 11:57, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Vexations (talk) 12:00, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support precious native tongue as tool --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:46, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support I find no reasons to not support the candidate as he appears well suited for the job. Flalf (talk) 13:28, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, trustworthy and good. BEANS X3 (talk) 13:37, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per above.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 14:02, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Fair, helpful and decent. Whispyhistory (talk) 14:25, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support don't really have much to add to what has been said above. Meets my RfA/RfB criteria (basically I trust that this user having 'crat rights will benefit the community). I agree with Ritchie333's comment, and consider this part of my reasons for supporting this candidate. Dreamy Jazz 🎷 talk to me | my contributions 15:04, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support. I rarely feel the need to emphasize how qualified I believe an editor to be but for WSC, I'm happy to make an exception. Regards SoWhy 15:20, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Good editor and administrator. No objections. ThinkHat (talk) 15:26, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support A reasonable and trustworthy editor. — CactusWriter (talk) 16:24, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support no problems, solid candidate. Willbb234Talk (please {{ping}} me in replies) 16:58, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - good choice. - Ahunt (talk) 16:59, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support without question! - Julietdeltalima (talk) 18:30, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- I have a good impression of WereSpielChequers within the context of RfA. I think he understands the system and the politics (for lack of better term) surrounding the system pretty well. Mz7 (talk) 18:40, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Absolutely. Trusted, experienced, tons of experience specifically with RfA. -- MelanieN (talk) 18:45, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- On the subject of whether it's necessary or prudent to appoint more bureaucrats, it's notable to me that the people who recently had to make a very difficult decision are telling us life would be easier with more hands on deck. With that in mind, I think WSC is as good a choice as any; they're deliberate and contemplative, gracious and professional, and not afraid to wade into the sorts of convoluted, nuanced discussions that most of us shy away from. Absolutely no concerns about trustworthiness or technical competence. – Juliancolton | Talk 19:10, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 19:39, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support - having known WereSpielChequers for many years, I know he'll do an excellent job in this role. Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 19:51, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - we need more bureaucrats.CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 20:08, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support: highly trustworthy and talented user with all the knowledge needed to evaluate consensus and not make technical mistakes. — Bilorv (talk) 20:10, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - good candidate for bureaucrat. JohnThorne (talk) 20:14, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - excellent candidate Pagliaccious (talk) 20:20, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Hard to believe that "we don't need more bureaucrats" is the best argument that opposers can muster. The number of active bureaucrats has been declining over time, and RfBs are few and far between. The downside in having more than we need is far from apparent. More importantly in my mind, candidate has demonstrated the attributes that we look for in bureaucrats over a period of many years. Happy to lend my support. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:26, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Obvious support. WereSpielChequers is probably one of the most qualified individuals to become a bureaucrat given their long interest and involvement at RFA. Mkdw talk 20:44, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - no concerns. GiantSnowman 20:49, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Clearly qualified and trustworthy. Thanks for considering using 2FA since the security risk is the main reason for us not to have more crats. 2FA really wasn't as annoying as I thought it would be, but it is definitely dependent on how you use Wikipedia. ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 21:49, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per Dweller etc. Bureaucrat is an odd role in that we don't need that many of them day-to-day, but having a healthy, varied and active number of them is important for the overall health of the process. WereSpielChequers is a long-term and sensible admin who is very much a good choice for another one. ~ mazca talk 23:35, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Stephen 23:37, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Good candidate, no concerns. We obviously need more active 'crats. Miniapolis 23:59, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Had always seen WSC as a strong positive contributor to the project and now, after reviewing his record of admin decisions, I am happy to support unreservedly. Loopy30 (talk) 00:23, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Unquestionably qualified with no persuasive arguments offered against. -Ad Orientem (talk) 00:52, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - No concerns and a great candidate. -- Dane talk 01:31, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - No concerns and a great candidate. Lightburst (talk) 01:55, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - About time. I am so pleased to see this. WSC was the first Wikipedian I ever met in real life and he went out of his way to travel a long way to meet me in the UK on one of my rare trips back to blighty many, many years ago. Over the years he has been extraordinarily helpful to new users and unwittlingly mentored many more. We have closely collaborated regularly on several projects both on and off-Wiki, including Wikimanias, meetups, reforms of RfA and NPP among others. In real life he is a mature and highly respected member of his community. Irrespective of any comments in the oppose section, recent activity has, IMO, clearly demonstrated that more active 'crats are needed, especially for closing RfAs. There is no one on Wikipedia who is not already a 'crat whom I could more highly recommend. If I were to prepend strong to my vote, which I never do, this is the most sincere RfA/RfB vote I have ever made. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:50, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support – Long overdue. I've always thought that WereSpielChequers would make a great bureaucrat. Kurtis (talk) 07:42, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Seems thoughtful and well-versed in RfA issues. Station1 (talk) 08:31, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- 20 Mule Team Support As others have said this is an overdue request. A long time asset to the project and a well versed and thoughtful Wikipedian. MarnetteD|Talk 09:05, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Don't see any problems here. InvalidOS (talk) 13:36, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Another great candidate. Yes absolutely. - FlightTime (open channel) 13:40, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support qualified candidate. The most recent crat chat proves this position is still needed. I don't want a bunch of mostly out-of-touch Wikipedians popping in to make judgement calls on close RFAs. ZettaComposer (talk) 14:02, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support: Excellent candidate for bureaucrat. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:41, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support I think I actually opposed the RfA. Since then WSQ has been a great admin and will make a great bureaucrat. ~EDDY (talk/contribs)~ 16:08, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. From what I have seen the candidate has an appropriate temperament for the work. · · · Peter Southwood (talk): 19:45, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - for the minor bit that a bureaucrat has over an admin, this is a trivial decision. The "oppose" arguments are ridiculous. Too many bureaucrats? Nonsense. Not enough content creation? Irrelevant. ~Anachronist (talk) 20:52, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Good, and good luck! — sparklism hey! 21:55, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong support: calm and thoughtful, and knows as much about RfA as anybody on-wiki. His temperament and knowledge make him an ideal fit for 'cratship. --RexxS (talk) 00:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I wanted to return to my !vote having seen the opposers' arguments and WSC's answers to further questions. I can confirm my strong support, and state categorically that I am unswayed by the arguments to the contrary. I find no merit in suggestions that there is no "need" for more 'crats, as a recent cratchat showed that a larger pool of crats would go some way to reducing the time an RfA candidate has to spend waiting, by allowing some crats to recuse or be inactive for a while. The cratchat on my own RfA last year lasted almost 3 days and it wasn't the most pleasant 70 hours of my life. Nor do I feel WSC should regret declining to answer questions asking him to re-examine a recent RfA cratchat. His sensitivity toward how the candidate may still be feeling about the experience is telling, in my opinion, of WSC's ability to see the bigger picture. My support stands. --RexxS (talk) 02:00, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Happy to support WSC. Have only had positive views of their work. Glennfcowan (talk) 01:28, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support L293D (☎ • ✎) 02:39, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, mainly on the strength of the nominator who I have always found to be pleasant, level-headed, and a net positive to any discussion I have ever seen them in. Ifnord (talk) 04:40, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, I particularly like the answer "turned the battleground page into a disambiguation page for the two". This was a good resolution of a slow-burn battle. Also the original encouragement by others on User talk:WereSpielChequers#Wikipedia:Requests for bureaucratship/WereSpielChequers seems sincere and well-motivated. --Lent (talk) 07:10, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, GregJackP Boomer! 11:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC).
- Support. An excellent admin who has plenty of common sense (essential in a crat, even more than for an admin). --bonadea contributions talk 12:42, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Sure, I'll support. No real reason for me (in my opinion) to oppose. Quahog (talk • contribs) 14:40, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. No concerns; a long-term, sensible, reliable, and level-headed contributor. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:54, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. No hesitation here. With all due respect to the current crats, the body of users with extra tools needs to represent those with both experience and current activity in the core areas of the project. WSC fits that criterion very well. Vanamonde (Talk) 15:31, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support trusted user. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 17:24, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Lepricavark: You've already !voted to support here, number 49. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- I must be losing my marbles. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 04:32, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Lepricavark: You've already !voted to support here, number 49. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:29, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support trusted user. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 17:24, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Looks good to me. Regards, Comte0 (talk) 23:23, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Weak support. Certainly a good candidate, but I'm not entirely convinced we need two more 'Crats. While some 'Crats thought so, the 'Cratchat they feared would drag on without resolution actually did not. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:30, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Not terribly convinced we need more crats (and not a huge fan of crat chats), but that's not a good argument against a good candidate. —Kusma (t·c) 10:29, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per Davey2010 Class455 (talk|stand clear of the doors!) 12:46, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Richard Nevell (talk) 13:13, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support--AhmadLX-(Wikiposta) 14:23, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support _ I can't say I know you well but I like your answers to the questions and I think you will make thoughtful contributions as a crat. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 14:32, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Jianhui67 T★C 15:28, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- I feel the same way as Cwmhiraeth: I can't say I know WSC well as an editor, but the answers to questions leave me with no concerns about their being a crat. I say that even though I actually disagree with the answer to my hypothetical (Q23), in the sense that if I were assessing the consensus, I would have weighed the various categories slightly differently than WSC, and would have ended up finding (marginal) consensus to promote. However, the question isn't whether WSC would close every discussion the same way that I would; rather, the question is whether they are capable of competently assessing RFA consensus, and I think their explanations are thoughtful, and they have demonstrated that competence. I find "we don't need any more" to be an unpersuasive argument against a specific candidacy. Even if one assumes for the sake of argument that we don't need more, it certainly wouldn't hurt any to have more. I was also glad to see the answer to Q22, as I'm strongly opposed to crats unilaterally overturning office actions (as opposed to, say, after an RFC). Levivich (talk) 16:58, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support been interacting with them for years and they have proven pretty darn sensible.©Geni (talk) 20:13, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Thoughtful, experienced, no doubt will do well as a bcrat. ~SuperHamster Talk Contribs 01:33, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
Weak: Wikipedia is all about random internet volunteers building an encyclopedia. For RfAs, it shouldn't be pure content creation. emoji's RfA was based around copyright. Content creation shouldn't be the pure basis for RfXs. There is a lot more. Community relations, clean up, dispute resolutions, article talk discussions, and many more. This nominee says content creation is the main basis. So for that reason, instead of a nuetral 50/50 vote, or a regular support, I have weak support. But, I do respect his opinion. Everything else, normal support.Can I Log In (talk) 01:53, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - thought they already were one. Anarchyte (talk | work) 08:13, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I can certainly support this candidate. Regards, —GenQuest "Talk to Me" 10:40, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. The answers to the questions show that WereSpielChequers would competently handle a
widerange of bureaucratic duties. I switched from "neutral" after reading answer #23. — Newslinger talk 11:28, 1 March 2020 (UTC)- @Newslinger:...what
wide range of bureaucratic duties
would that be then? :) ——SN54129 11:35, 1 March 2020 (UTC)- Questions #18 (on assigning the bot flag) and #22 (on restoring the sysop bit) show two different duties, and I thought the answers were reasonable. But, you're right, there aren't that many bureaucratic duties. — Newslinger talk 11:42, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- @Newslinger:...what
- Support - obvious - David Gerard (talk) 12:18, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - excellent work as admin, and as copy-edits to my many typos! Support - Looks good to me. Not a "hat collection" thing - I'm appalled to learn that most of the bureaucrats have been in the post for over a decade, and that three haven't edited yet this year. Those are clear signs that fresh eyes are needed, as part of succession. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 12:30, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support This user has the background experience as an admin to demonstrate that they are unlikely to abuse the bureaucrat rights. I am additionally persuaded by this user's in-person, off wiki reputation for participating in Wikipedia events and social gatherings. I also like that they write for The Signpost, because communication is key to the bureaucrat role. Having both experience and personal ties to various aspects of Wikimedia projects and people makes me comfortable with this nomination. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:48, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support The oppose rationales presented so far don't persuade me. If currently active crats say that they would have a need for more crats, I'm inclined to take them at their word - the question of how frequently the need arises doesn't seem relevant, if it would be useful only occasionally when why refuse it? I can completely understand why WSC wouldn't want to comment on a recent specific case, I think it would be inappropriate of them to do so. Nosebagbear's oppose concerning relevant experience seems to me to hold most water; weighing that against my general impression of WSC as a level-headed, collaborative editor and admin however, I find myself unconvinced that they wouldn't be able to weight consensus competently and fairly, and so I am here. Thanks for standing. GirthSummit (blether) 15:36, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Yes for sure. - FitIndia Talk Commons 18:20, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Strong Support - fully qualified. — Ched (talk) 18:26, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support no reason to think they'd misuse the extra tools. FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:40, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - no reason not to support. Best, Tymon.r Do you have any questions? 01:26, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I highly doubt WereSpielChequers will misuse the tools Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 01:47, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support, will be fine. Fish+Karate 09:57, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support, I personally think Q11 shows the sort of maturity that should be expected from a soon-to-be crat. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 14:52, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support "Thought he was one." Deb (talk) 15:00, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support without reservation. Nole (chat·edits) 17:06, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support without reservation. Thought he was one already. ~ Matthewrbowker Comments · Changes 17:12, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Gleeanon409 (talk) 19:44, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I am still not entirely sure what the function of the crats is other than sysopping administrators. Maybe that is it. If the crats think we need more crats, I will support qualified candidates unless there is a reason to oppose. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:48, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - It would be a shame to turn away a qualified candidate on the grounds that "we have enough". If that is a rationale here for some then I suggest they get a proposal going to set a quota. Trying to manage that from within RfBs is like running a perpetual ad for open positions but then telling interviewees that you aren't hiring. He is helpful, thoughtful and qualified for the position and I believe that he will do well.
— Berean Hunter (talk) 20:08, 2 March 2020 (UTC) - I've interacted with WereSpielChequers many a time in the last decade (though it's been far too long) and, in all of those interactions, he was demonstrably thoughtful and deliberative (as he has been in answering questions here) but also prepared to take a viewpoint and back it--but in a way that exhibits the dexterity of a mind that is willing and able to entertain other viewpoints and even change his own mind. His prior involvement in the RFA reform efforts and the subsequent evolution of his views on the matter is an example; a more personal anecdote is the objective, helpful advice and feedback he provided me when considering an RFA myself way back in 2011--his understanding of the process then (as now) indicates to me a temperament of someone who can evaluate merits in a dispassionate way--an even-keeled voice in the room whom I support. Tyrol5 [Talk] 00:50, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Obviously qualified. ~Awilley (talk) 01:15, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support --DannyS712 (talk) 02:50, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Trust their judgment, and specifically their A to Q11 is appreciated. --Bison X (talk) 03:56, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Happy support - One of the most common editors I see around and have strong impression of a long history of good work. I beleive judgement is good but even more importantly to me, I know the editor is commited to building a high quality encylopedia and would be mature enough to admit and rectify lapses in judgement. Good luck. Jason Quinn (talk) 05:26, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Very pleased to see WereSpielChequers running. The candidate is one of the most prolific RfA nominators and I trust their wisdom will be quite useful in cratchats. I completely disagree with arguments that there are too bureaucrats; there are not enough active bureaucrats and the lengths of recent cratchats speaks to that. Obvious support. Altamel (talk) 06:02, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. High quality candidate. Britishfinance (talk) 10:42, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. No reason why not. Conlinp (talk) 13:05, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Trusted and well qualified. TheGeneralUser (talk) 14:35, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support- I'm the kind of person who supports unless I see a reason to oppose. I don't even mind that they didn't really answer my first question-if I was WereSpielChequers, I would have felt unconfortable assessing that RFA, too... King of Scorpions 16:11, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. WereSpielChequers is one of our foremost experts on RfA, having been studying and participating in discussions about it for many years. Both on- and off-wiki I have also found him one of the most thoughtful and levelheaded Wikipedians I have ever met. He will be a wonderful addition to the bureaucrat team. the wub "?!" 17:46, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
Oppose
- Per my own and unique interpretation of WP:NOTBURO. There is no obvious, compelling or persuasive need to create more people in a role that has extremely limited scope and has ample members to jump on an RfA within seconds of it expiring. Looks ever so slightly like a hat collecting opportunity, but hey, who am I to say. I've only been here 14 years. Leaky caldron (talk) 19:43, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- (Not intending to "badger" an opposer, comment for information only.) During the recent 'crat chat about a very close RfA, it was suggested that having some new bureaucrats might be helpful. I suspect that both of the current RfBs were motivated by these comments, rather than by any personal motive of the candidates. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:24, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- In which case let's remove some of the deadwood and refresh the panel. We don't need more functionaries and I feel quite sure that these candidates would know very well how to provide highly influential input without possessing tools which are not actually needed for a 'crat chat. Having said that, having refused to answer highly pertinent questions about the very subject you raise is a red flag for me anyway. Leaky caldron (talk) 18:46, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- (Not intending to "badger" an opposer, comment for information only.) During the recent 'crat chat about a very close RfA, it was suggested that having some new bureaucrats might be helpful. I suspect that both of the current RfBs were motivated by these comments, rather than by any personal motive of the candidates. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:24, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Speaking in generalities, a user who only plans to use a specific right one to two times a year (the current frequency of crat chats) should not have it. * Pppery * it has begun... 21:50, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I oppose for the same reasons as in my oppose in SilkTork's RfB, that there is no demonstrated need for additional bureaucrats, despite the merits of the nominee as an editor. If bureaucrats considering a crat chat need more views to consider, they should read the talk pages..--Wehwalt (talk) 23:02, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Wehwalt: Not looking to sway your decision, but my principle desire for more bureaucrats is to implement the 2015 RFC requests, in particular, the clerking mandate. Additional voices at bureaucrat discussions would - imo - be nice, and perhaps help resolve them in less than 100 hours, but that would be a secondary reason. –xenotalk 23:30, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose per Pppery. Gamaliel (talk) 19:54, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Strong oppose I find it troubling that the candidate refuses to answer a question about the very thing they say they would partake in if they were to become a bureaucrat. Nihlus 23:41, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Which question are you referring to, Nihlus? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:18, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- 11 and 12 were not answered. Nihlus 01:31, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- They were answered, and a follow-up question was asked in turn. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 10:57, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Ritchie333: The candidate stated they won't answer it (and I am not seeing a follow-up question). Am I missing something? --qedk (t 桜 c) 13:30, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Putting text under a question does not mean he has answered it. Nihlus 21:45, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- They were answered, and a follow-up question was asked in turn. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 10:57, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- 11 and 12 were not answered. Nihlus 01:31, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Which question are you referring to, Nihlus? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:18, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - partly because Wehwalt has a valid point. Nothing against you personally, but you've been with Wikipedia 13 years, since April 2007. And you only have 2 Good articles, and 88 page creations total, 28 of which are stubs, 16 are disambiguations and 1 dab. So, really, you only have 43 pages that are articles. And except for the GAs, your work doesn't seem to have gone through any review processes. Indeed, why do we need more bureaucrats. But more to the point, why do we need a bureaucrat with very little hands-on experience for what might come up. — Maile (talk) 02:00, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose. With all due respect, you can't submit yourself to RFB after a contentious 'crat-chat closed RFA and punt on questions about it. Calidum 18:07, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Regretful oppose I am not aware of WSC's reasoning as to why they require a hypothetical question, but either way I cannot trust a crat to make a judgement in future crat chats if they cannot assess past crat chats. I also find their answer to Q10 on trendlines to be unsatisfactory and on the verge of a "non-answer". I hold WSC in the highest regard but the answers are too disappointing for me to support. --qedk (t 桜 c) 21:37, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose Long term contributor, I have seen them around, including correcting my mistakes & have no doubt about general competance, temperament etc. The reason I am in the oppose column is that the main purpose of bureaucrats is to weigh up consensus in contentious RfAs & I haven't seen any activity remotely like that, including in the self nom - if anyone can point me in that direction I would happily change this to a support. As I said re silktorq as existing crats have requested more, I am happy to go along with that request. --Find bruce (talk) 04:19, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - leaning oppose. I'm not against them not talking about ME's CRATCHAT, and they're a highly competent admin and editor. However, I'm concerned about the candidate's stated lack of prior closing (and thus controversial closing) experience. A CratChat isn't like, say, an AfD, where there is a major substantive difference between chat participants and the closers - where only the latter is concerned about assessing close-related aspects like consensus judging. In a cratchat, every bureaucrat is, in effect, closing (the RfA) and making their own independent close judgement, with the final 'crat summarising. Given the move away from bot-tasks for crats, I feel that a significant experience in closing is the most critical requirement for any candidate otherwise in good standing. Nosebagbear (talk) 10:08, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose A number of the candidate’s answers concern me. Firstly I don’t think any bureaucrat should be closing as unsuccessful an RfA that finished above the discretionary range without even a crat chat, no matter how precipitously the support fell. Secondly I’m not impressed with their admission that they are not really one for closing, as I think it is essential that they have that experience. Finally I feel they should have taken one of the opportunities go say how they would have voted in a previous crat chat - these are valid, pertinent questions which cannot really be adequately replaced by hypotheticals. P-K3 (talk) 02:10, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose Per Wehwalt. Bobherry Talk Edits 13:05, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose, Q11 was valid, and I would want to know how a would-be crat would handle such a situation. Being too uncomfortable to take a position doesn't bode well for the ability to wade into future contentious RfAs. Seraphimblade Talk to me 23:23, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose. Long-time user whose judgment and temperament I trust. However, the logic of a couple of the answers is a bit convoluted. Since the user doesn't seem to have a huge track-record of controversial closes, and isn't willing to opine in the answers on how they would have closed recent controversial RFAs, I can't judge if they'd be a net positive in such situations. Since I don't think we actually have a problem with not enough bureaucrats (a one-off knife-edge situation in which 10 bureaucrats don't quite agree in my mind doesn't scream "we need more bureaucrats"), I ultimately end up here. Martinp (talk) 12:42, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
Neutral
Neutral As I don't know the editor, I have little to base my opinion on beyond raw edit statistics, the candidate's responses to questions, and editors' opinions following those responses. Four out of five editors whom I respect greatly (@Serial Number 54129, Atsme, Amakuru, and Ymblanter:) all speak very favourably of the candidate, but I'm waiting to hear (a) from MJL based on the candidate's response to MJL's question and (b) the candidate's responses to the remaining questions. No real concerns, but just looking to evaluate more opinions before deciding.Doug Mehus T·C 20:52, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Neutral. I'm uncomfortable with the fact that WSC doesn't want to discuss Money emoji's RFA 'crat chat. Weighing these sorts of line-ball decisions is what we are potentially empowering them to do, yet they do not wish to discuss how they see the most recent one? To me, the issue of "content creation opposes" is a key issue in the RFA process, as demonstrated by Money emoji's RFA and the 'crat chat that followed. I'd like to know where WSC stands on this before supporting or opposing. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 01:37, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Peacemaker67, such questions are not rare at RfA/RfB and people may not share my view, but I do not think it is appropriate at an election, RfA, RfB, Arbcom, etc, to require a candidate to state how they would have voted on a previous cut and dried RfA, RfB, Arbcom, election, noticeboard, XfD, or Arbcom case that has been closed by what we hope are competent individuals and can no longer be changed or redebated as the case may be. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:29, 27 February 2020 (UTC).
- I disagree. It demonstrates how they weigh evidence, and is a good predictor of future decision-making. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:34, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- It is perfectly possible to discuss "content creation opposes" or any other RFA criteria without discussing particular individuals without those individuals consent or even notification. If anything the result of that is more relevant to future Crat chats than a particular past one as a future crat chat that seems similar on some grounds may look different when other criteria are taken into account. I regard insufficient content contributions as a perfectly valid reason to oppose. It is also a relative thing, what would be insufficient to one editor might not be insufficient to another. Hence there have been RFAs which passed despite some opposes being for insufficient contributions and others that have failed on just this one issue. I think that the defacto minimum for a new admin in the current era is to demonstrate the ability to add reliably sourced content. But reasons for Opposing an RFA are usually cumulative, so an editor with many DYKs and even a GA might fail RFA if there were a bloc of opposes for their incivility and a few for their minimal content contributions in the modern era. Equally, RFA being a discussion, I would be happy to discount opposes for lack of content contributions as being refuted if they had been responded to with a dif and the comment "you do know they wrote an FA?". Unless of course that had been responded to with "yes, nice prose, but delisted a decade ago for lacking inline citation. The candidate's uncited content contributions in the early days of the pedia were valid in their day, but the expectation nowadays is that candidates should know how to cite." ϢereSpielChequers 12:37, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Peacemaker67: If you intend for this to be a "Neutral" vote, you need to unbullet this, if you wish to just comment, use the section below. --qedk (t 桜 c) 12:42, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
Neutral. WereSpielChequers clearly has a strong positive reputation as an editor and administrator, as evidenced by the high number of supporters on this page. However, one of the main duties of bureaucrats is to assess consensus in contentious RfAs, and I think the answers to the questions lack concrete examples of how WereSpielChequers would handle this duty. Answers #11, #12, and #17 were missed opportunities to demonstrate WereSpielChequers's thought process in evaluating actual discussions. I understand that it is inconvenient to comment on specific editors, but I would have appreciated some practical example of how WereSpielChequers would close a real discussion. — Newslinger talk 11:27, 28 February 2020 (UTC)- I'd say inappropriate rather than inconvenient, especially as one of the three is someone who I have been trained by and have said I'd recuse from a cratchat about them and another has only just gone through RFA followed by a cratchat; and last I checked none were notified that someone wanted to publicly reexamine their RFAs. That said there are now three hypotheticals in and responded to. ϢereSpielChequers 11:38, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Thank you for your answer to question #23. (And thanks to Levivich for crafting this scenario.) I've switched to "support". — Newslinger talk 11:28, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- I'd say inappropriate rather than inconvenient, especially as one of the three is someone who I have been trained by and have said I'd recuse from a cratchat about them and another has only just gone through RFA followed by a cratchat; and last I checked none were notified that someone wanted to publicly reexamine their RFAs. That said there are now three hypotheticals in and responded to. ϢereSpielChequers 11:38, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Peacemaker67, such questions are not rare at RfA/RfB and people may not share my view, but I do not think it is appropriate at an election, RfA, RfB, Arbcom, etc, to require a candidate to state how they would have voted on a previous cut and dried RfA, RfB, Arbcom, election, noticeboard, XfD, or Arbcom case that has been closed by what we hope are competent individuals and can no longer be changed or redebated as the case may be. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:29, 27 February 2020 (UTC).
- Neutral Wikipedia is all about random internet volunteers building an encyclopedia. For RfAs, it shouldn't be pure content creation. emoji's RfA was based around copyright. Content creation shouldn't be the pure basis for RfXs. There is a lot more. Community relations, clean up, dispute resolutions, article talk discussions, and many more. This nominee says content creation is the main basis. So for that reason, here is a 50/50 vote. I do respect his opinion though. Can I Log In (talk) 02:16, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Hi Can I log in. The vast majority of my edits, and my main focus has as I said been in mainspace and improving content - mostly through typo fixing. But I have also made a few tens of thousands of edits that are dealing with vandalism, welcoming and helping newbies, taking part in the deletion process, reviewing articles at FAC, and indeed taking part in the RFA process. However, just because my main focus has been on improving content, doesn't mean I expect that of others, I have happily supported clueful candidates in RFAs whose main focus has been elsewhere, provided they have made some edits that are adding content cited to reliable sources - content contributions are one of my RFA criteria, as I understand them to be of a large proportion of RFA voters ϢereSpielChequers 08:59, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
General comments
- Could those citing "no need for any more crats" explain how blatant vandalism sat on Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Cabayi unaddressed for five hours? Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 11:48, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Ritchie333: the revdel didn't go far enough, it's still visible as of Amorymeltzer's latest edit. Well spotted. Why aren't RfA's protected if IPs can't vote? ——SN54129 12:01, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Fixed. IPs can leave comments; we do have a couple of long-term editors who prefer not to have an account. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 12:07, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- The whole "General comments" section should be moved to the talk page. Cheers, ——SN54129 12:15, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Unless I am mistaken any passing Admin. can remove vandalism anywhere. Am I wrong? If I'm correct then the proposition that we need more 'crats to handle vandalism in RFA seems misplaced. Leaky caldron (talk) 22:04, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Any editor, registered or IP, is able to remove vandalism from any page they are able to edit. However, there is a convention that pages that have clerks assigned (e.g. RfArb, RfA, etc.) are only to be clerked by those clerks. Most folks simply wouldn't risk the hassle of being told "it's not your job to clerk this page" and the argument about whether it's actually vandalism or not. --RexxS (talk) 21:06, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Unless I am mistaken any passing Admin. can remove vandalism anywhere. Am I wrong? If I'm correct then the proposition that we need more 'crats to handle vandalism in RFA seems misplaced. Leaky caldron (talk) 22:04, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- The whole "General comments" section should be moved to the talk page. Cheers, ——SN54129 12:15, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Fixed. IPs can leave comments; we do have a couple of long-term editors who prefer not to have an account. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 12:07, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Ritchie333: the revdel didn't go far enough, it's still visible as of Amorymeltzer's latest edit. Well spotted. Why aren't RfA's protected if IPs can't vote? ——SN54129 12:01, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- The above bureaucratship discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
- The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for bureaucratship. Please do not modify it.
SilkTork
Final (168/8/2); Closed as successful by Primefac (talk) at 12:25, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
Nomination
SilkTork (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) – It is a rare occasion that we are able to consider the nomination of a new bureaucrat, so I am humbled to be able to nominate SilkTork. SilkTork has been a stable, knowledgeable member of our community for many years - he consistently demonstrates clue and ability to make good judgements and is pushing towards 100k edits with a definite lack of controversy. Personally, I have worked with him on Arbcom twice, where I've found him willing to listen, weigh up arguments and speak his mind, definitely not someone to just follow the crowd. I've also found that he is extremely passionate about this encyclopedia and proud to be part of it.
So, it's not surprising to me that after a call for more bureaucrats, SilkTork would step up. We recently had a very close call on a crat chat, and needed more voices. Our 17 crats, however, were mostly elected a decade ago, 3 have not edited yet this year, 3 of us are stuck on Arbcom (and so may have to recuse en bloc) - simply we need some more crats, last year we lost 5 and only replaced 2. I believe SilkTork would be an excellent choice in this role. WormTT(talk) 09:41, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: Thanks for doing this Worm. I accept. SilkTork (talk) 11:38, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Questions for the candidate
Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as a bureaucrat. You may wish to answer the following optional questions to provide guidance for participants:
- 1. Have you read the discussions on when to promote and not promote? What do you understand the criteria for promotion to be?
- A: We have a rough guide that above 75% confirms sufficient community confidence, below 65% indicates insufficient community confidence, and that RfAs falling between these figures is at bureaucrat discretion. If consensus is not clear, even above or below these guide figures, or there is some controversial aspect to the RFA then a 'Crat chat is called. The bureaucrats then give their individual assessment of the consensus in the discussion, and also take consideration of what the other 'Crats are saying. SilkTork (talk) 11:38, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- 2. How would you deal with contentious nominations where a decision to promote or not promote might be criticized?
- A: I feel it is important when closing a controversial or unclear RfA that the 'Crat or 'Crats closing give a clear and understandable rationale. If an RFA is contentious then people are unsatisfied with a close that gives either no rationale or a poor one, regardless of the outcome. A close that explains the thinking behind the rationale, even if the close is opposite to the one desired, can be accepted by most people as per: "I disagree with the outcome, but I understand the reason for it." SilkTork (talk) 11:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- 3. Wikipedians expect bureaucrats to adhere to high standards of fairness, knowledge of policy and the ability to engage others in the community. Why do you feel you meet those standards?
- A: I have closed many difficult or contentious discussions over the years, and twice been a member of ArbCom. People ask me to close discussions, and I think that is because I have a reputation for being honest, fair, and balanced, and that I will listen to objections and engage fully and openly with people. On my talkpage I have had for some years a quote by Barack Obama: "I will listen to you, especially when we disagree", and I try very hard to live up to that. I try to keep up with policy changes, but I am aware that our Wikipedia world is vast and complex, and there are areas where I am not familiar. If I am commenting on something, I will check the relevant policies and guidelines to make sure my understanding is up to date. The more important the discussion, the more carefully I will check the relevant policies and guidelines. None of us know everything. SilkTork (talk) 11:50, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional questions by Nosebagbear
4. What is your viewpoint on the usage of trendlines in CRATCHATs - yes, no, certain circumstances etc? If not clear-cut, please feel free to give lots of detail.
- A: All aspects of a RfA are worth considering, including how voting patterns may change after new information is brought in. How much weight to put on the trend depends entirely on the circumstances. If the trend's outcome is conjectural I would rather have seen the RfA extended than conjecture one way or another. A convincing steady long term upward or downward trend that has reversed the early trend is worth taking into account, as it's not often that trends go one way, then another, and then back again (though, they can do). A late surge in the opposite direction of the general trend needs to be thought about rather than dismissed, though for me is unlikely to be as convincing as a steady long term trend, unless there were an obvious reason, such as a late discovery of some significant material, such as a totally undisclosed second account that had been making personal attacks. SilkTork (talk) 14:52, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
5. What degree do you think a candidate's support % should impact on a CRATCHAT discussion/result, once it's within the discretionary zone?
- A: The support % may be an indicator that a chat is needed, though it's the nature of how that percentage was achieved that matters more. A support percentage at the lower end of the zone in a RfA in which negative material had been disclosed late on, and there was 100% trend to oppose with supporters moving to oppose, is unlikely to need a chat, while one at the same % in which opinions have been divided throughout the RfA, and there are plausible views on both sides, is one that is likely to need a chat.
- Actually, I just noted you're not asking about the decision to go for a chat, but about the impact on a chat that has already opened. I can't speak for how other 'Crats would treat the support %, I can only speak for how I would approach it, which would be along the same lines as I've just outlined - that it's how the % is reached that matters more than the actual %, but the % has to be borne in mind as it is in itself an indicator of community consensus. SilkTork (talk) 14:52, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional questions from QEDK
- 7. Can you give examples of contentious requests for comments you have closed yourself or as part of a panel? You can also give examples of any contentious discussion excepting ArbCom proceedings.
- A:I'll give you the last five discussions I have closed. I was asked to close this discussion this morning: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Books_from_Cambridge_University_Press, I was asked to close the Race and intelligence DRV a couple of days ago: Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 February 12. Then it goes back to Nov when I closed some overdue AfD discussions: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Super-chicken Model, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Erica C. Barnett, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/ManuelbastioniLAB. SilkTork (talk) 15:45, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- 8. If you were a crat assessing Money emoji's RfA, what would your assessment be?
- A: Good question. I'll need to give some time to that. SilkTork (talk) 15:46, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Supports are positive about the candidate's skills, knowledge and experience - particularly in the area of copyright, a number indicating no concerns or red flags, and when the opposes built up a number reaffirmed their support. And while temperament and maturity were among the concerns of the opposers, a number of supporters spoke positively about temperament, behaviour, trustworthiness, maturity, or demeanour. The opposes are mainly on temperament/maturity and content creation, and focus on two incidents - a frustrated retirement message, and the lack of involvement in the Pizzagate article. As these incidents became better known, the opposes increased. The opposes and supports were valid (albeit seeming at times contradictory, as the supports were seeing positive maturity and temperament, while the opposes were seeing negative maturity and temperament, but this is partly down to individual interpretation of the available evidence) so the trend becomes interesting. What would have happened if the RfA had continued? Looking closely at the ivoting on the last three days I see support votes: 16th 10, 17th 11, 18th 11 - so mildly growing rather than decreasing, but mostly static. I see oppose votes: 16th 10, 17th 16, 18th 10. So it blips on the 17th but then returns to 10, but mostly static. I do not see in this a definite trend either way. We cannot conjecture from this which way the voting would have gone. The community are fairly divided on their interpretation of the candidate, but the finished % is that more are in favour, and the % falls within the accepted promotion range. Added to which, a number of the oppose comments say things like (from the last day): "reluctant", "weak" and "consider supporting in 6-12 months". So I would have voted to promote. SilkTork (talk) 10:42, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Follow-up question
- 8.1 When you state
I do not see in this a definite trend either way
, do you think it is possible to gain reasonable conclusions from the trend and have it factor in your consensus to promote (or not)? If yes, why, if not, why not? This question is ofcourse with the addendum that no new information has suddenly been introduced, remember we are talking about Money emoji's RfA.- A. All factors are worth considering, and some are going to be more clear than others. The unclear factors are the ones where there will be some interpretation, which will differ from person to person depending on their own knowledge, experience and character. Some will give more weight to one aspect than another. Which is why a 'Crat Chat is useful - to have a chance to see the way that others are interpreting the RfA. I can see that it is possible to conjecture from the trend positives and negatives. The positive is that there is a slight growth in the last three days of supports, and that on the final day there were slightly more supports to opposes. The negative is that the opposes in the last three days total more than the supports, and though they drop on the last day they don't drop significantly behind the supports. My own conclusion from this is that the negatives and positives balance out - they can be argued either way. We know that overall the trend in RfAs is for supports to come in earlier and opposes to come in later (though there are plenty of exceptions to this - typically where the candidate is clearly not ready or is controversial). And that has to be taken into consideration when looking at a closing trend. Now this is not a live 'Crat Chat, so I don't have a chance to see how other 'crats respond to my interpretation, which may alter my thinking; so if you feel that there are aspects of my interpretation which are weak or muddled or even wrong, I'd welcome you putting your views forward here so I can re-scrutinise my interpretation. SilkTork (talk) 09:16, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Barkeep49
- 9. What do you make of the overlap between Arbitrators and Bureaucrats? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:00, 25 February 2020 (UTC) Edit: To be clear I am asking about overlap in the composition of the two groups, not responsibilities. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: 'Crats and Arbs tend to be among our most experienced and trusted users. They tend to be individuals who are not afraid of dealing with controversial topics, are not impulsive, and can explain their thinking. The qualities that make a typical Arb tend to be the same qualities that make a typical 'Crat, which is probably why there is sometimes an overlap. SilkTork (talk) 17:07, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Dmehus
- 10. Related to Barkeep49's question above regarding the apparent overlap between Arbitrators and Bureaucrats, what do you make of the apparent overlap between Stewards and Bureaucrats? What, if any, current Bureaucrat duties could you see being handled by Stewards and, conversely, are there any tasks handled by Stewards currently that would be better in-sourcing back to English Wikipedia Bureaucrats?
- A: I don't think I see the same overlap between stewards and bureaucrats as I see between arbitrators and bureaucrats. Stewards I see as being the general administrators for Wikimedia, while 'Crats have a specific role on their local Wiki. Where a local Wiki can handle matters themselves, I feel it is better that they do so, so I would not want to see any role that eng.wiki can do being given to stewards. Stewards can globally block users, which means a steward can block a user on a local wiki, including our own, without going through local community process and consensus. While I understand the need for such global blocks, I would prefer that major wiki communities, such as eng.wiki, be responsible for all blocks on their own community. As such, I would prefer that the stewards and/or WMF consult with the local wiki 'Crats and/or Arbs to request we uphold a global block, and allow us to impose it (or not, if we so decide) ourselves. I value our independence, and respect our decision making. (Disclosure, I did apply to be a steward many years ago, as I had an interest in helping out on other projects, and I was voted in, but then disqualified because I hadn't done the paperwork. I can't recall exactly what it was - I think it was perhaps because I hadn't shown WMF my identity papers, so that would have been before I joined ArbCom.) SilkTork (talk) 17:07, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Rschen7754
- 11. In the past you have pretty emphatically said that administrators should voluntarily subject themselves to a reconfirmation RFA every X years. (I'd have to dig to find those diffs). Is this a position that you still hold?
- A: Yes, I think that would be of value, though I have noted some resistance by the community to what could be seen as arbitrary reconfirmations. Like you I would have to dig back for diffs, but I do remember some such comments in a few reconfirmation RfAs, which struck home to me, as I could see that a recon without a specific purpose (recent criticism, long time inactive, etc) could be seen as wasting the community's time. There may, though, be an appetite for recons for all ten year+ admins, as ten years is a long time in Wikipedia, and much has changed in that period. SilkTork (talk) 16:11, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Pharaoh of the Wizards
- 12. Do you think this question "Have you edited under previous account" asked in several RFA as it appears by some editors as it appears to than that the candidate fails WP:DUCK is appropriate in the context of this Wikipedia:Clean start#Requests for adminship says candidates are not obliged to publicly disclose previous accounts.
- A: The question is appropriate as we have had users in the past applying for adminship without disclosing previous accounts, and this generates distrust and unease. If the candidate doesn't wish to reveal their previous account publicly, they can do so privately to ArbCom, and then answer the question by saying yes they had a previous account which has been disclosed to ArbCom. The responsibility then passes to the Committee who may decide to make a statement regarding the candidate's suitability, as in "The Committee has examined the conduct of the previous account and see no reason why the candidate should not apply to become an admin". If the Committee feel that there are valid reasons why the candidate should not apply to be an admin they could advise the candidate not to apply (or to withdraw), making them aware that if they persisted then the Committee would make a public statement such as "The Committee has examined the conduct of the previous account and feel the community should be aware that there are seven blocks for edit warring and three for personal attacks." SilkTork (talk) 07:18, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- 12A. Do you think Candidates should disclose whether they had a previous account in a RFA (without the naming the account).Particurly for those making there clean start after conflict rather than privacy reasons.
- 13. Do Crats have the right to use there discretion rather WP:IAR in there decision making or have to compulsory follow policy in each and very decision ?
- A: I can't speak for other 'Crats but if appointed I would independently analyse and interpret the consensus of the RfA discussion informed by policy. IAR is there for those cases where following a rule would harm the project in some way, so if it was appropriate to use IAR in a RfA then I would do so. I can't think of an example right now (which is what IAR is for - those instances we hadn't previously thought about, and so don't have guidance for). SilkTork (talk) 07:18, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Nihlus
- 14. How would you have determined consensus during the RexxS and Jbhunley bureaucrat discussions?
- A: I will come back to this a little later. SilkTork (talk) 07:47, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- RexxS finished just outside the discretionary zone, as such there would need to be an exceptional reason to promote. A point to take into account as something exceptional is the timing of the RfA on April Fools Day by Bishonen's alternative account, Bishzilla, which is used for humour. Both oppose and support comments mentioned the timing and the joke account. People appeared to vote how they would normally - I don't see any user that appear to have been misled to place a support or oppose vote under the impression that it was a joke, and that were not later amended. Objections to an RfA being started in such a manner are valid, so can't be discounted. I'm not seeing the date or the use of a humorous alternative account as being an exceptional circumstance that prejudiced unfairly the RfA one way or the other. The opposes are as valid as the supports, and the percentage of the community deciding to promote did not fall within the range that the community by consensus agreed on. I don't see anything unfair or untoward in the RfA. From the start the opposers were clear in why they were opposing, and that reason remained solid throughout. I don't see any reason to dismiss or diminish the validity of the oppose !votes and comments. I would have voted that there was no consensus to promote. SilkTork (talk) 14:17, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Jbhunley finished at a higher percentage support than RexxS, though was one of the first to go to a 'Crat Chat under the extended range. There appear to be four areas that come up more than once among the opposes, and that is content creation, language and other behaviour (including behaviour during the RfA), behaviour during an ArbCom case request, and pro-deletion attitude at AfD. The AfD opposes were only three, so not significant. The content creation was also less significant than first appears, as a number of opposes mentioned content creation to say that it wasn't an issue for them, or was a minor concern - I count only 14 who weight content creation highly. The bulk of the concern was behaviour - with 70 citing that as a reason. But if we take away those who focused on the ArbCom case (41), then behaviour concerns are only cited by around 29 people. The supports are very strong, and include 67 supports that directly mention in some way the oppose for behaviour (I've not counted those who mentioned the oppose for content creation, as it was not the major reason for opposing). Most of those who mentioned the behaviour in the support comments came later, and a number of those who had supported earlier, came back not just to reaffirm their support, but to address the behaviour issue and say that it was not a concern for them - the general trend of the support thinking is that the behaviour issues were not that common for the candidate, and that admins did not have to be angels. Looking at the trend. The last four days voting go like this: Support: 10, 17, 31, 4 (total=62). Oppose: 9, 4, 5, 0 (total=19). The most compelling oppose was temperament, particularly during the ArbCom request, but that was addressed by increasing supports toward the closing days of the RfA which indicates to me that the community had considered those concerns, and the consensus was that they were not that important. My vote would have been that there was consensus to promote. SilkTork (talk) 17:26, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Tymon.r
- 15. The community has once decided to lower the discretionary range for RfA closures to 65-75% (of support). Do you believe it was a good decision? Should it be lowered even further (e.g. per WP:!VOTE) to let 'crats evaluate consensus and arguments in more cases?
- A: The first admins were selected (almost randomly) by Jimbo because it was "no big deal". The idea being that if you're working here on Wikipedia, then you must have good intentions. Sadly we have discovered that not everyone has good intentions, or they have good intentions but poor judgement or an uneven temperament. The RfA was brought in to allow the community a chance to look at someone's editing history in order to assess their judgement and temperament. In the early days these RfAs were not advertised, so someone could become an admin with minimal scrutiny. As such, we did have problems with some admins being appointed who turned out not to be suitable. With RfAs now being advertised more widely, and community turn out being quite high, there is intense scrutiny, and so having the discretionary range at 65-75% feels appropriate. I feel we are appointing a more solid and reliable bunch of admins, despite the lower range, because of the greater scrutiny. I'm not sure that lowering the range any further would actually assist us in continuing to elect solid and reliable admins. It may do more harm. What would help is encouraging more candidates to step forward. Both for admin and for 'crat. What puts people off is facing difficult questions and some hostile opposes. Now, a part of being an admin or 'crat is the ability to face up to scrutiny, and to respond to even hostile questioning. People are often hostile because they don't understand, and so the hostile critic requires a respectful answer as much as the polite inquirer. However, there should be a limit to how much hostility anyone should face when volunteering to help out on a charity project. And I have noticed in recent years a greater tendency for 'crats to monitor and clerk RfAs. I find this a positive tendency, and one that I think is more helpful than lowering the discretionary range. SilkTork (talk) 07:47, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- 16. How many 'crats do we need on English Wikipedia? Why some administrators should never become 'crats?
- A: As this is a volunteer project with no time schedules and no contracts, there may be times when crats are simply not available. The more crats we have, the more chances there are that there will be enough volunteers available to do the job. I see no reason to put a limit on it. What we can do is perhaps consider setting a quorum for 'Crat Chats - that there should be a minimum and maximum number of 'crats involved. But I see no reason to limit the pool from which the quorum is drawn. SilkTork (talk) 07:47, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- I'm not seeing a reason why all admins should not become 'crats. Admins are trusted to judge consensus and close discussions, and that is the main function of the 'crats job. It's an extra level of trust and responsibility, so it is appropriate that the 'crat rights are not automatically bundled into the admin tool set, and that people apply separately. Indeed, I feel that some of the tools in the admin set could be split out now to allow a greater range of users to have access to some of the tools. There could be an editorial set of tools, such as protection, and the ability to move articles to previously used titles with an edit history, given to experienced editors. Not everyone wants the ability to block other others, but may value the ability to perform useful tasks helpful to the project. So I wouldn't advocate for the crat rights to be bundled into the admin tool set, but I would encourage more admins to apply to be a 'crat - as far as I'm aware the 'crat common room has a limitless supply of comfy chairs and tea and biscuits. SilkTork (talk) 09:15, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Trialpears
- 17. Crats have the ability to grant interface administrator rights and thus have all the same security risks as an interface administrator. All users with interface administrator access are required to use two-factor authentication (2FA) due to security risks involved with the permission. Would you be willing to enable 2FA to minimize said risks?
- A: Security questions are awkward because in answering them certain information may be revealed. I understand, though, your concern because if a 'crat account is hacked that account could then give interface admin rights to a roque account. I will therefore affirm that my account is secure. SilkTork (talk) 09:15, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional questions from Altamel
- 18. Former admins with no edits for two years since their tools were removed cannot apply through WP:BN to regain their sysop flag. Is this a bright-line rule, or can bureaucrats weigh whether the former admin's editing history demonstrates an intent to resume actively performing admin duties? For instance, a case where the former admin has been staying just barely above one edit per year.
- A: Two years with no edits is a policy, so that is a bright line. The person would need to apply via RfA. The second part of your question is trickier. One year of no activity, and so desysopped, and then one edit 6 months later, and then a request at BN 6 months later means by the letter of law they can apply at BN because they haven't gone 2 years with no edits. Though the person can apply at BN, that doesn't mean the 'crats are obliged to restore the rights, and if such a request were to occur, and I were a 'crat, I would call for a 'Crat Chat to look into the circumstances. If that one edit was sublimely wonderful, and indicated ongoing interest in and understanding of Wikipedia then I would be inclined to be favourable, if it were a small edit, then I would likely decline and suggest RfA. SilkTork (talk) 09:52, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- 19. If a bureaucrat unilaterally closes a tight RfA, can/should they consider requests from the community to have a crat chat close the RfA instead?
- A: Yes. All requests should always be considered. We have IAR for a reason, and should not blindly follow the letter of the law, but look at the intention behind the words. It is the intention that matters not the sometime inadequate wording we use to convey that intention. Process is there to help the project, it is not there to be followed for its own sake. I like that we have due process, as that is the summing up of previous consensus. But consensus can change, so while following process, we should always keep an eye open for process which is no longer appropriate or not meeting current consensus. So any request should be examined to see if it is reasonable, and to check if the 'crat has missed something important. That is not to say that a 'Crat Chat should be opened on request, but that the request itself should always be considered. SilkTork (talk) 09:52, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional questions from Andrew D.
- 20. The account name SilkTork is intriguing and you say that you've used it since the 1990s. I find that Tork is a brand of hygienic paper products but that seems an unlikely connection. Please explain.
- A:SilkTork is a name I first used when I joined Audiogalaxy (AG) back in the 1990s. AG had many members, and selecting a name wasn't easy - everything I chose, someone else already had, so I set about constructing one. Silk is a material I like. I thought of silk scarf, that led me to silk torc - a torc being worn around the neck like a scarf. I am Celtic so the torc seemed appropriate. I selected a k at the end instead of a c because when younger I liked Tyrannosaurus Rex (saw T. Rex at Weeley in 1971), and torc put me in mind of Steve Peregrin Took whose name, incidentally, is close to mine: Steve Pereira. This was not as considered a thinking process as I am making it out to be - I came to SilkTork in much less time than it has taken to explain it! SilkTork (talk) 15:02, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from 2001:e68:543a:c579:4943:cbe8:4563:9d96
- 21. This refers to an issue discussed off site.An editor socked for 6 months using his college IP despite being warned clearly violating WP:SOCK ,WP:3RR ,Edit warring .Now the editor also used his real name on the project and had his edits were oversighted before the RFA which also covered his socking from the community.There are 2 arguments are over this one, regressive to take action now after 6 years or other argument that there is coverup and candidate would not have cleared his RFA had it not been oversighted.Which one is right ?
- A: If this is a real incident I think it is better for you to take your concerns to ArbCom in private for them to look into it, rather than have me speculate over it in public. If it is a hypothetical, and it happened six years ago, and the person has done six useful, productive years as an admin, then hypothetically I see little value to the community or the project in bringing the matter up now. SilkTork (talk) 15:02, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Leaky
- 22. Please describe examples of possible conflict of interest which would cause you not to participate in a 'crat. decision or discussion.
- A:The obvious is of course any involvement in the RfA, and then it would be any relationship (on or off Wikipedia), negative or positive, with the candidate that might be seen as likely or possible to influence judgement. That's sometimes tricky to judge, as we can't always gauge how other people may see a relationship. As an Arb I felt that if someone objected to me being involved in a case because of a relationship or conflict that I would simply recuse without question, but such blind compliance could lead to gaming the system, so if someone asked me to recuse where I had not seen myself a reason to recuse, then I would consult with the rest of the Committee. Another possible reason is where I might have not been involved in the RfA but had formed a judgement myself. I think that would depend on the circumstances. When looking at the three RfAs in the questions, I had an opinion while looking at them of which way my !voting would have gone. I won't say which, nor how many, but in those three RfAs my 'crat conclusions are not necessarily the way I would have voted. I think, though, that reaching a conclusion opposite to my personal opinion where the decision doesn't matter is not quite the same as reaching a decision where it does matter. However, I have closed a number of discussions over the years which I did not actually agree with, but that was the consensus. When looking at an AfD, and noting that the consensus is to delete, but I can see valid reasons to keep, then I have not closed that discussion, but !voted instead. Each circumstance tends to be a little different, and I don't think there is going to be one formula that fits all, but where I think my judgement might be clouded, I will recuse. SilkTork (talk) 18:17, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Robert McClenon
- 23. What other functions besides Crat Chats on RFA candidates do bureaucrats have? Please explain as appropriate. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:07, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Most of the functions are detailed on Wikipedia:Bureaucrats. Essentially, 'crats have tools that can grant and remove certain extra rights. 'Crats are limited to certain circumstances when they can grant or remove those rights, all of which require following consensus. So while 'crats can make someone an admin or a 'crat or interface admin, etc, or remove some of those rights (not 'crat rights), they can't do so on their own whim, they have to do so following clearly defined process. This doesn't mean, though, that it's simply a switch flicking role, otherwise it could be done automatically; 'Crats sometimes need to make judgements as to if a user (or bot) meets the requirements. Where making that judgement might be particularly difficult or sensitive, a 'crat chat of some sort will take place. But most cases where 'crats are involved do not require such chats, such as desyopping due to technical reasons such as inactivity. In addition to what's on the crat page, some 'crats who have the global renamer right also do name changes, including usurping existing but unused names; but of the 17 'crats we have at the moment, only six have got that right, and while some users here have the right but are not 'crats, my understanding (and somebody correct me if I'm wrong) is only a local 'crat who is a global renamer can do usurpations. SilkTork (talk) 19:02, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Hawkeye7
- 24. Bureaucrats are not limited to certain circumstances when they can grant or remove rights, are not required to follow consensus, and can and have exercised their tools based solely on their own judgement of the situation. Given that WP:IAR is a pillar, that bureaucrats are specifically chosen for their judgement, and that they are highly trusted members of the community, is there is any need or call for clearly defined processes, and if so how could they be made binding? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:22, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- A: Interesting question. I am away from home at the moment, but should be able to respond Sunday evening, or Monday morning at the latest. SilkTorkAway (talk) 12:29, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- I'm not following the first two phrases in your question, because as far as I'm aware 'crats are limited to certain circumstances and are required to follow consensus - unless you mean that 'crats have the technical ability to do things outside consensus. Each tool that a user has grants certain technical abilities, but if a user uses these tools outside consensus they will face questions, and - if appropriate - sanctions up to being banned from the project. A non-admin has the tools to revert continuously, but if that person does so they will face questions, and if there is no justification, they will be blocked. So, each of us has a responsibility to follow consensus. 'Crat, admin, registered user and IP. And each of us can IAR if our policies and guidelines prevent us from doing the right thing. The difference between an IP, a registered user, an auto-confirmed user, an admin, and a 'crat is that each successive user group has more access to the tool set and so there is a greater need for responsibility in the use of those tools. Provided their IP address is not blocked, any person can themselves decide to assume the extra access that being a registered user allows. The next step is done automatically when a user has edited for a certain number of days and made a certain number of edits. The next two steps are only done by active community consensus. But, essentially we are all responsible for the tool set we are given. We are all, regardless of user group, expected to follow consensus, including invoking IAR where appropriate. SilkTork (talk) 09:35, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Additional question from Can I Log In
- 25. Currently, there is no official Request for de-adminship system. The only way to remove an admin is by admin request through two options, or by ArbCom. In question, for involuntary removal, ArbCom would be indirect removal. If there were to be a direct Request for de-adminship system, do you think Bureaucrats should get involved? Can I Log In (talk) 02:37, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
Discussion
- Links for SilkTork: SilkTork (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
- Edit summary usage for SilkTork can be found here.
Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review their contributions before commenting.
Support
- Obvious support is obvious. Per nominator... me. WormTT(talk) 12:18, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- No clear reason not to. Money emoji💵Talk💸Help out at CCI! 12:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I admit that I'm slowly edging to the position that should be getting rid of the user group, rather than augmenting it. But SK was one of the few members of last year's ArbCom to emerge with any kind of grace, and the self-reflection that indicated suggests the nuance for this particular hat is already possessed in spades. ——SN54129 12:23, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support All the best. —Nnadigoodluck🇳🇬 12:24, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Stephen 12:31, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I like pie. Steel1943 (talk) 12:35, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Discussion moved to the talk page. Steel1943 (talk) 23:46, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support my impression of SilkTork is that he is thoughtful, and consistently makes judgements that are in the best interest of the project. - MrX 🖋 12:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Fine with me. Deb (talk) 12:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Very happy to support, great candidate. ϢereSpielChequers 12:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - trustworthy admin. PhilKnight (talk) 12:52, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Trustworthy, thoughtful and deeply experienced. - SchroCat (talk) 12:59, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Noting that while I prefer getting rid of crats and making everything they do so discretion free that stewards could do it, if we are to have them, they should reflect the current community, and SilkTork is trusted and reflects the current community. TonyBallioni (talk) 13:03, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. A trusted admin experienced in using measured, rational arguments in assessing consensus and closing actions. My full support. Loopy30 (talk) 13:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I know it's cliché, but i've seen the candidate around so long and making such reasoned and reasonable statements that, without checking the pop-up, i truly though that he already was; thus, absolutely support. Happy days, LindsayHello 13:16, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Absolutely a plus to the crat corps. Cabayi (talk) 13:34, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, yup, seems good to me! BEANS X3 (talk) 13:41, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Fully support SK as working with them on ArbCom was a pleasure. Will serve well I feel. RickinBaltimore (talk) 13:49, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - A highly trusted administrator. Carrite (talk) 14:14, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Enthusiastic Support I don't even need to read the nomination statement (I will, though) as SilkTork is one of our most neutral and objective administrators we have. Their ability to assess consensus in tight situations is well proven. No concerns whatsoever. Doug Mehus T·C 14:16, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support wholeheartedly. Very impressed with his work on ArbCom.-- P-K3 (talk) 14:17, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Have worked with him extensively on GAs (eg: North Circular Road, Faversham), he is always civil and polite, is capable of disagreeing calmly and rationally, and he has apologised personally to me for things he thought were a mistake, showing great compassion. I trust his judgement and views completely. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 14:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I first crossed paths with SilkTork in 2010, which means I've had (gets out calculator) roughly 10 (!) years to observe his approach to Wikipedia, which he clearly cares very much about. I agree with WormThatTurned that SilkTork would be an excellent fit for this role. 28bytes (talk) 14:32, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support There's not much left for Bureaucrats to do and one of the tasks is closing RfA. New 'crats jump to the opportunity to provide a timely close to obvious outcomes, however, when a 'crat chat is called, as one was recently, it seems to be a bit of a challenge to get enough 'crats together. We've had a couple of new 'crats recently and that might change things so adding Silk Tork to the list of genuinely active 'crats might not be a bad idea. As an admin he has performed 100% correctly, and the Arbitration Committee has lost a serious, fair and impartial member. Echoing Ritchie333's thoughts above, there is little chance that as a Bureacrat he will do anything controversial so I see no reason therefore why I should not support. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 14:35, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 14:55, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Very good and trustworthy admin. Puddleglum2.0 15:22, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support heartily. I think I have only encountered SilkTork a few times, like Talk:Central Park/GA2, but my interactions with them are always helpful. To me, they are one of a few admins that would be perfectly fit for promotion to bureaucrat status. epicgenius (talk) 15:27, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, enthusiastically. – bradv🍁 15:38, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per nom who said it all. – Ammarpad (talk) 15:53, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- 100% --In actu (Guerillero) Parlez Moi 15:54, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I trust SilkTork's judgement, and think that they would make an excellent crat. SQLQuery me! 15:59, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support SilkTork has been around a long time and is clearly a very knowledgable, experienced and trusted Wikipedian with a wide field of experience that makes him well suited to become a bureaucrat.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 16:02, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - We need more crats here! Class455 (talk|stand clear of the doors!) 16:04, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- The examples given in answer 7 above demonstrate that the most important remaining job of bureaucrats - judging consensus in controversial RfA's - is a job for which SilkTork is well-qualified. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 16:05, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:08, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support we need more active crats. This candidate seems like a good one. --rogerd (talk) 16:19, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Happy to support - trusted, well-regarded candidate. GirthSummit (blether) 16:27, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support I really like the answer to Q4. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 16:28, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support on the strength of the nomination and nominator. Ifnord (talk) 16:38, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I was a little surprised that the candidate had to go back to November to have 5 (non-arb) closes. That said, their closes (particularly their R&I DRV one) was excellent. Regarding their Q4 & Q5 answers, it's not completely in line with my preferences, but I do believe that they demonstrate a capability to think through the area well enough to be a benefit to the corps. While I too would like 'crat candidates with shorter time as admins, that's in no way a negative against this particular candidate - both is fine by me! Notwithstanding any future questions on bots, I think Silk is a worthwhile addition to the 'chat. Nosebagbear (talk) 16:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support A trusted name, with an equally trusted nominator. No qualms. Rcsprinter123 (shout) 16:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - As per User:Worm That Turned. - FitIndia Talk Commons 17:02, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support no problems. As expained by nom, we need more crats. Regards, Willbb234Talk (please {{ping}} me in replies) 17:04, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- An excellent choice for crat. SilkTork's greatest strength is his ability to listen and to treat all editors and opinions with respect, even when facing criticism, even when facing very strong criticism. ST's experience and even temperament will be an asset to the crat corps. Levivich (talk) 17:07, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- No hesitation. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:12, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Highly trusted, very competent. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 17:15, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support the candidate, but I'm actually not convinced that we need any more bureaucrats. Wouldn't hurt to have another sensible voice there, I suppose. El_C 17:30, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. It is time for SilkTork to take silk. Newyorkbrad (talk) 17:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Newyorkbrad:, (edit conflict) Brilliant response! The best I've read thus far. Doug Mehus T·C 17:43, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- No concerns, perfect candidate. -- CptViraj (📧) 17:41, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support having seen him around my whole time here, ST seems ceaselessly level-headed and thoughtful. I completely trust his judgment and would be happy to see him added to the bureaucrat corps. Thank you for volunteering! Ajpolino (talk) 17:51, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support No issues. We need more crats. ~EDDY (talk/contribs)~ 17:55, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- SilkTork's 2018 ArbCom Candidate Statement shows an editor who understands their role in and the importance of community decision-making. An easy support. — Wug·a·po·des 18:16, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Absolutely. Silk has been an upstanding admin, and it really is time for some more crats. CaptainEek Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 18:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I would probably have supported them without reservation a year ago, but this last year taken my opinion of them up a notch. Guettarda (talk) 18:28, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - absolutely! Atsme Talk 📧 18:39, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support a thoughtful person willing to look at both sides --Gerda Arendt (talk) 19:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I like SilkTork. That's all I got. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 19:23, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support No reason shown they cannot be trusted to be impartial.--MONGO (talk) 19:25, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support will be a net-positive to the project. The idea that more users in a the 'crat role is a bad thing is silly. If anything, adding more takes away from the exclusivity of the user right, and thus its perceived importance. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 19:46, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support--Ymblanter (talk) 20:23, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support -- per Worm. Competent user with good judgement. --TheSandDoctor Talk 20:36, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Trusted user. No qualms. Cbl62 (talk) 22:17, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support The candidate seems to have bureaucratic levels of clue. A trout is gently offered to those editors who feel net positive candidates should somehow be denied the right because they are volunteering for free but not volunteering for free enough times a year. Airbornemihir (talk) 22:28, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Yep--v/r - TP 22:33, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support WP:TTWOA. OhKayeSierra (talk) 22:51, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Weak Support due to issues raised by the opposers, but otherwise a good candidate! Foxnpichu (talk) 22:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- My principle desire for more bureaucrats is to implement the 2015 RFC requests, in particular, the clerking mandate. Additional voices at bureaucrat discussions would - imo - be nice, and perhaps help resolve them in less than 100 hours, but that would be a secondary reason. It's also probably unwise to wait until there's an urgent need for bureaucrats, as by then it may be too late. SilkTork would make an excellent addition to the bureaucrat team. –xenotalk 23:41, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Levelheaded editor who will make a good anything. Not sure why we need to measure "need" since the future is uncertain (and the end is always near). --regentspark (comment) 02:08, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per Worm. Mgasparin (talk) 02:30, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - great admin and will definitely make a great 'crat too. Tolly4bolly 02:41, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, no concerns, and am sure that this user will be a fine bureaucrat. Glad to have another onboard! Utopes (talk / cont) 04:06, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support no concerns! Royalbroil 04:12, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:16, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- SilkTork is just the kind of admin I support for bureaucrat, even if we don't need more 'crats; of the two, SilkTork is the one I have trusted now for several years to exercise the kind of judgment needed in 'crat decisions, and beyond. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:27, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, without reservation. I have only seen good work from this administrator, and, to quote myself from the previous discussion, because "it is good for the project to inject fresh blood into positions such as these, even if we are perceived to have enough officeholders to perform the function". BD2412 T 04:19, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per WormTT(talk) and xenotalk. If memory serves me correctly, as few as four crat chat votes have been enough to decide an RFA. A few more, especially in view of last year's net loss of bureaucrats, would be helpful. Silk Tork has been a fine administrator and admirable member of Arbcom. Donner60 (talk) 04:26, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Lourdes 04:42, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support --I am One of Many (talk) 06:38, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Why not? -FASTILY 06:53, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. A great choice. Station1 (talk) 06:58, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Of course! This is a good candidate and we need more good bureaucrats. PI Ellsworth ed. put'r there 07:49, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per the supporters.--!nnovativ (talk) 08:26, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support based on my experience working with SilkTork (3 years sharing an ArbCom term). AGK ■ 09:51, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Clearly level-headed and some great answers, thus far. Full confidence. Nick Moyes (talk) 11:34, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. The positions in SilkTork's answers are well-argued. The selection of closures of contentious discussions in answer #7 shows reasonable judgment. — Newslinger talk 11:37, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per nom. Solid admin and would make a good crat. 1.02 editor (T/C) 11:50, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Experienced, incisive, trustworthy. Vexations (talk) 11:53, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Seems like a great candidate! Pax:Vobiscum (talk) 12:39, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - SilkTork was on the ArbCom for a while last year, and my observation there was that they were showed excellent insight into the issues, were thoughtful and intelligent, and importantly were willing to engage with the community during cases, and respond to people's concerns and opinions. I was sorry to see them leave the committee, and am glad that they're here volunteering again for an upgrade to the shiny buttons. I am also impressed by their answer to question 8 - it shows that they have a good grasp of the issues raised at the recent RFA, and ability to analyse the relevant "trends" in the context of the overall RFA, rather than drawing a line-of-best-fit on the trend graph with a ruler, and coming to the dubious conclusion that the candidate would have certainly failed if the RFA had continued. Good luck, and I look forward to seeing your decisions at future RFAs. — Amakuru (talk) 13:22, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Looks like an ideal candidate! Flalf (talk) 13:24, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Well-qualified candidate. — CactusWriter (talk) 16:32, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support pretty much per nom. Meets my RfA/RfB criteria (as I can trust that they will use the crat tools to benefit the community). We need more crats IMO (the recent crat chat is the reason why I think this). Therefore, I support. Dreamy Jazz 🎷 talk to me | my contributions 17:10, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support without reservation. - Julietdeltalima (talk) 18:31, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I see no issues. In fact some of their answers were what made me decide to vote at all. Specifically numbers 11, 13, 14, and 20. PackMecEng (talk) 18:44, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Trusted, experienced user. His answers to questions confirm my impression that he has good clue and a good sense of what the community thinks. -- MelanieN (talk) 19:01, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 19:39, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Mike Peel (talk) 19:54, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Seems to be a really good candidate to be a 'crat. Abzeronow (talk) 20:03, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support sounds like an ideal candidate and the answers above are insightful. --AFBorchert (talk) 20:04, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Qualified candidate, trustworthy. Would make a great bureaucrat.CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 20:06, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- No problems here. Even if there are only two or three uses of the crat role a year, I don't think that's a big deal. It's not as if having a scarcely used role harms the wiki. Nohomersryan (talk) 20:17, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - no concerns. GiantSnowman 20:50, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Clearly competent and qualified. Will provide some insightful comments to cratchats. The horrible possibility of someone malitious and competent getting their hands on a crat account (or any of the high risk user rights really) is something that keep me up at night and I think anyone with advanced user rights should seriously consider using 2FA in addition to a strong and unique password which is why I asked the question. I can say from my own experience that it really isn't as annoying as I thought it would be. ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 21:32, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - qualified candidate. JohnThorne (talk) 21:52, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Thank you for answering my questions. While I disagree with some of the conclusions, I have no reservations over the logic that you used. Nihlus 23:46, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Excellent candidate, and we obviously need more active crats to close ... well, close RfAs. Miniapolis 23:54, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Unquestionably qualified with no persuasive arguments against. -Ad Orientem (talk) 00:53, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support: No problem with this guy ... Daniel Case (talk) 00:59, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support I have come across this editor on the project. Lightburst (talk) 01:34, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support: I have been impressed with Silk Tork across the project for a long time, including as an arb and admin. I might not have voted but having seen a number of opposes to prevent the number of bureaucrats from growing, I wanted to support a clearly qualified candidate because I see no reason not to have additional 'crats; additional active ones would have been useful in the recent RfA. BlueMoonset (talk) 03:38, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Good candidate. Even if additional crats are only needed for the rare crat chat, it is better to have a larger pool. So I can see the need to have more even if there is not much work to do. PaleAqua (talk) 03:59, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support -Absolutely, complete trust. Give them the updated mop! - FlightTime (open channel) 04:10, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Discussion moved to the talk page.
- Support – No reason not to. Kurtis (talk) 07:45, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Clearly trusted and experienced. Jianhui67 T★C 08:33, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support qualified candidate. The most recent crat chat proves this position is still needed. I don't want a bunch of mostly out-of-touch Wikipedians popping in to make judgement calls on close RFAs. ZettaComposer (talk) 14:03, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support well qualified, also liked answers to the questions. Not sure if there is any practical need for additional crats, but having more won't hurt either.--Staberinde (talk) 18:54, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - respected Wikipedian, can be trusted, and the opposition arguments don't hold water. ~Anachronist (talk) 20:48, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support: highly trustworthy and talented user with all the knowledge needed to evaluate consensus and not make technical mistakes. — Bilorv (talk) 23:43, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support has demonstrated experience in dealing with controversial matters in a manner that shows both temprament & judgement. As existing crats have request more, I am happy to go along with that request. Find bruce (talk) 23:58, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - In all my interactions with SilkTork over the past twelve years, he never let me down. Whether he'll use the 'crat rights twice a week or twice a year, I see no reason to pass up on the services of someone as diligent and dependable as he is. Owen× ☎ 00:16, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I still don't really know what a 'crat does, but I trust that SilkTork won't do anything harmful. I have been satisfied with the candidate since they tried to mediate the Tea Party Movement dispute, where they did a credible job of attempting what was later seen to be impossible, American politics. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:46, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support L293D (☎ • ✎) 02:40, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support because candidate is excellent editor and admin, and I can see some upside to having another crat, and can't see any downside. 78.26 (spin me / revolutions) 04:14, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support per nom. power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:52, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Per nom. SpencerT•C 05:30, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support an excellent editor and admin, am happy with the response to QEDK's question about Money emoji's 'crat chat, and see no problem with having more 'crats. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:36, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support trustworthy admin.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 06:05, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - SilkTork's history of edits are good developments, particularly with pages branching off a primary page. --Lent (talk) 07:25, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support a very trusted admin and a level head, I've worked with SilkTork and seen SilkTork work with a number of problem editors with a level head and steady tack, always in line with our core principles. I think SilkTork would be a good bureaucrat. --Tom (LT) (talk) 09:33, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, a content creator and a good admin. GregJackP Boomer! 10:20, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, quality editor and person.♦ Dr. Blofeld 12:33, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support based on my experience with this editor. Debresser (talk) 12:58, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support – SilkTork is highly competent and sensible, and would be a good bureaucrat. Thoughtful and well-reasoned responses to the questions above. --bonadea contributions talk 13:22, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support A trustworthy admin. Quahog (talk • contribs) 14:38, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I recall being impressed by a level-headed RfC close by SilkTork some time ago. I looked at their contributions then and felt they were close to being an ideal editor. I have a lot of faith in their ability to handle bureaucratship. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:57, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Sensible, trusted user. Good luck! — sparklism hey! 18:08, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support so far the experience has been good. ⋙–DBigXrayᗙ 20:37, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Qualified and trustworthy, he would be an asset to the bureaucrat team.
— Berean Hunter (talk) 21:01, 28 February 2020 (UTC) - Support - Fit and reasonable candidate. I will expand this later if time allows, just wanted to place my mark here if it does not. — Godsy (TALKCONT) 21:49, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support I agree that some fresh bureaucrats would be helpful, and SilkTork is very well qualified. Nick-D (talk) 22:26, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Weak support. Certainly a good candidate, but I'm not entirely convinced we need two more 'Crats. While some 'Crats thought so, the 'Cratchat they feared would drag on without resolution actually did not. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:32, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Of course.--Wikimedes (talk) 07:20, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Not terribly convinced we need more crats (and not a huge fan of crat chats), but that's not a good argument against a good candidate. —Kusma (t·c) 10:29, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Richard Nevell (talk) 13:15, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - SilkTork should make a useful bureaucrat, I particularly liked the answer to question 15. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 14:56, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support Comte0 (talk) 17:29, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support, I have consistently experienced SilkTork to be levelheaded and have very good judgment. I find the reasoning in the opposes as of this writing entirely unconvincing. Seraphimblade Talk to me 23:35, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I supported SilkTork's RfA and I'm not aware of him doing anything subsequently to make me doubt that that was anything other than a good choice. Happy to support the recommendation for a crat role danno_uk 23:47, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
- Support - definitely a good editor and administrator, and my first choice out of the 3 RfBs active at the time of this !vote. Kirbanzo (userpage - talk - contribs) 00:00, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - Take him while you can get him. maclean (talk) 05:14, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I see no valid reason to oppose. Anarchyte (talk | work) 08:20, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support to outweigh the ludicrous "oppose" reasons - David Gerard (talk) 12:19, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support Definitely. Fresh eyes are needed, and SilkTork qualifies. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 12:32, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support no reason to think they'd misuse the extra tools. FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:40, 1 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support – Answers to Q15&Q16 prove very mature attitude of the candidate. Thanks for them and thank you for your service! You're gonna make a great 'crat. Best, Tymon.r Do you have any questions? 01:30, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I highly doubt Silktork will misuse the tools Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 01:45, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I appreciate SilkTork's thoughtfulness and willingness to keep an open mind. Both are good qualities for a bureaucrat. Also, good answers to the questions. Altamel (talk) 06:13, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support, why not? Fish+Karate 09:54, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - I have always thought of SilkTork as a thoughtful and insightful editor whose presence tends to improve a discussion. Wikipedia would be benefit from SilkTork becoming a bureaucrat. WJ94 (talk) 12:47, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support - SilkTork's contributions to discussions and closures tend to be noticeably more thoughtful than most - and combined with the overall good balance of work, seems like an excellent bureaucrat candidate. ~ mazca talk 15:43, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support welcome addition to the ranks. Gleeanon409 (talk) 16:20, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Yesssss! — kashmīrī TALK 19:17, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
- Yup! Can understand policies and expectations on wikipedia as a former ArbCom member, admin, and soon a bureaucrat. To reply, copy and paste this:
{{SUBST:replyto|[[User:Can I Log In|Can I Log In]]}}
[[User talk|(talk)]] - Support Smart, trustworthy, and a good temperament for the job. I'm particularly unconvinced by the opposition citing lack of content work. My first interaction with SilkTork was years ago when they did a GA review for me. ~Awilley (talk) 00:57, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. I'm not convinced we need more bureaucrats (since I don't think there really has been a problem with recent RFAs), but SilkTork continues to demonstrate the right level of clue and thoughtfulness to be a net positive to this role. Martinp (talk) 01:10, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support --DannyS712 (talk) 02:50, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Trust their judgment, and who cares how many crats there are. --Bison X (talk) 03:51, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Reflective, humble and involved. Britishfinance (talk) 10:34, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support I've seen SilkTork's work over the years and trust their judgement as an admin. Their well rounded experience and thorough knowledge and demonstration of policies and guidelines shows that they will be a good bureaucrat. TheGeneralUser (talk) 12:02, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
- Support. Very well qualified. I've often noticed SilkTork's insightful contributions to discussions around the wiki, and I'm sure their input will be valuable to the occasional 'crat discretionary decision. the wub "?!" 12:09, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
Oppose
- Per my own and unique interpretation of WP:NOTBURO. There is no obvious, compelling or persuasive need to create more people in a role that has extremely limited scope and has ample members to jump on an RfA within seconds of it expiring. Looks ever so slightly like a hat collecting opportunity, but hey, who am I to say. I've only been here 14 years. Leaky caldron (talk) 19:44, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Discussion moved to the talk page. qedk (t 桜 c) 20:47, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Speaking in generalities, a user who only plans to use a specific right one to two times a year (the current frequency of crat chats) should not have it. * Pppery * it has begun... 21:46, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- I think SilkTork is an admirable editor. I cannot see the point in elevating more bureaucrats. WTT spoke of the need for more voices in crat chats such as the recent one. There were many voices from which the crats could have drawn useful guidance, from non-voters on the talk pages, or from SilkTork themselves if desired. Are only the views of the crat-voters worth considering? Because to be honest, the individual votes of the crats seemed very I-know-it-when-I-see-it. If the opinion of one crat is not sufficient for a close close, are the opinions of 15 crats any better? What about 1,500? I am happy to honor SilkTork for their many contributions to Wikipedia, but I'm not sure the way to do it is to hand them a hat.--Wehwalt (talk) 22:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Sorry, but I have to oppose. Sir Joseph (talk) 04:20, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Sir Joseph: Opposing SilkTork is your right... But, would you please explain why you're opposing? OhKayeSierra (talk) 06:08, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose per Pppery. Gamaliel (talk) 19:58, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose - partly because Wehwalt has a valid point. Nothing against you personally, but you've been with Wikipedia 14 years, since January 2006. And you only have one Featured Article, and 192 article creations total, the rest of which appear to not have gone through any review process. Indeed, why do we need more bureaucrats. But more to the point, why do we need a bureaucrat with very little hands-on experience for what might come up. — Maile (talk) 01:49, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Discussion moved to the talk page. Doug Mehus T·C 16:33, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose as per Leaky caldron. –Davey2010Talk 10:55, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- Oppose Per Leaky Cauldron Bobherry Talk Edits 13:07, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
Neutral
Parking myself here since I fully intend to vote in this RfA dependent on the candidate's answer to Q8, until then, pretty neutral. --qedk (t 桜 c) 20:46, 25 February 2020 (UTC)This is a hard call because I intended on either supporting or opposing this candidate but I'm unable to do either. I find their answer to trendlines to be covering some bases, I hope they understand their nuanced answer to the question regarding trendlines means they understand how quickly it exhausts its usefulness. There is a fair bit of going around in circles in my follow-up question where albeit the candidate did ask me to ask more questions, the follow-up question was meant for exactly that. I do not think I need to be giving leading questions to get an ideal response. Fwiw, I consider SilkTork to be one of the better ArbCom members who has consistently displayed good judgement and have no problem either way if they get the crat bit, given that they will take the community view (on trendlines, as is being conducted at VPP) into account. --qedk (t 桜 c) 21:47, 27 February 2020 (UTC)- I believe you intended to write "RfB" instead of "RfA"? This is an RfB. Thanks, Puddleglum2.0 22:19, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Wait, this isn't a deletion discussion ...? Airbornemihir (talk) 22:36, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Neutral leaning support. SilkTork's answer to Q14 makes me admire his guts to disagree with the prevalent outcome in both cited RfAs, but at the same time worry that appointing him as a bureaucrat will mean that RfA crat chats will become more of a debate amongst crats. That said, his answer to Q13 and Q17 give me great confidence that he understands the philosophy behind both the social aspect and the technical aspect of Wikipedia. Deryck C. 12:53, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
General comments
- @QEDK: I think Nosebagbear already asked your question which SilkTork has answered. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:02, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- This comment is not intended and should not be taken as criticism or opposition to SilkTork. However, when I hoped that some fresh blood might join the bureaucrat team, I didn't have in mind someone who has been an admin for 12 years and been elected to ArbCom twice. I think it is important that we stop relying on old hands in key positions and look to editors from our younger "wiki-generations" to step up. I hope people looking at this RfB don't think you need SilkTork's resume to apply - I for one would love to see admins promoted over the last 5 years (sadly, they are all too few in number) running RfBs... WJBscribe (talk) 16:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- You have my full agreement on that WJBscribe, and I'd certainly happily talk to any of those younger admins nominating them as I have SilkTork. However, I would consider any "older" admin who passes RfB in 2020 or beyond to be a "new" crat. The reason for this is that they won't have the history with the role, renames, a 70-80% discretionary range etc - they will take on the role as it is now. An RfB is already such a rare thing these days that we shouldn't hold out for the unicorn. WormTT(talk) 16:31, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- @WJBscribe: If you're really looking for fresh blood, then nominate Newslinger. It's not like they're aren't qualified at this point. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 19:46, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
I was just wondering if I was alone feeling somewhat uncomfortable about @QEDK:'s general question asking for @SilkTork: to provide a comment on how they'd have voted in Money Emoji's CRATCHAT. The editor has just had a pretty abrasive 2 weeks, and while we expect admins to be reasonably thick skinned, having it reoccur for a third week seems a little harsh. Perhaps I'm over-estimating the potential problem or under-egging its probative value (of which there certainly is some) - but I wanted to see some broader thoughts Nosebagbear (talk) 22:59, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- @Nosebagbear: That's an interesting objection but statements in cratchats are about the assessment of consensus and not the candidate themselves. Given that the question has no real bearing on Money emoji's RfA (since it's done and dusted), I'm fairly confident Money emoji will not be bothered by an assessment of the consensus — their RfA has now come up in a ton of places citing difficulty in RfAs/lack of crats/trendline measures/what not (quite a unique RfA tbh), do you suggest we remove all of those instances in an attempt to allay this alleged situation as well? --qedk (t 桜 c) 23:07, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- @QEDK: - it was more a concern were Silk to say something about thinking certain oppose arguments were better grounded etc, rather than an issue of thinking that anything pertaining to it would be a concern (having raised related questions myself, that would be rather hypocritical at best) Nosebagbear (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- Yeah, no I totally understand your concern but I am certain enough that Money emoji would be able to deal with it. If they were to tell me to stop with this line of questioning, I definitely would, either way, I do agree with your concerns although I felt it was not problematic enough to not use as a testcase. --qedk (t 桜 c) 06:56, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- Also, I suspect you're missing one tilde (~) when you sign. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ --qedk (t 桜 c) 06:56, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
- @QEDK: - it was more a concern were Silk to say something about thinking certain oppose arguments were better grounded etc, rather than an issue of thinking that anything pertaining to it would be a concern (having raised related questions myself, that would be rather hypocritical at best) Nosebagbear (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
- The above bureaucratship discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
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- ^ Candidates were restricted to editors with an extended confirmed account following the discussion at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2024 review/Phase I § Proposal 25: Require nominees to be extended confirmed.
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- ^ The initial two discussion-only days are a trial measure agreed on following Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2024 review/Phase I#Proposal 3b: Make the first two days discussion-only (trial). It applies to the first five RfAs opened on or after 24 March 2024, excluding those closed per WP:SNOW or WP:NOTNOW, or until 25 September 2024 – whichever is first.
- ^ The community determined this in a May 2019 RfC.
- ^ Historically, there has not been the same obligation on supporters to explain their reasons for supporting (assumed to be "per nom" or a confirmation that the candidate is regarded as fully qualified) as there has been on opposers.