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Desysopping proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Well, this is yet another proposal for a desysopping system. I've recently been studying RFA2011 and RFA2013, and it seems quite obvious that reform will never work unless we have a way to remove admins (aside from ArbCom, which is very well known for being slow). Here's the proposal:

1. Before a case request is filed, the issues must have been extensively (struck "extensively" because it is a rather unclear word; "discussed" should be sufficient) discussed at other venues, such as the admin's talk page and ANI. The issues also cannot be minor. For a case to proceed, the admin must have displayed repeated poor judgement, or have committed a particularly serious violation (in these cases, however, ArbCom is likely to deal with it).
2. If all the requirements are met, the concerned user may file a case request.
3. After the case request is filed, two (possibly three; please specify your preference when you comment) completely uninvolved experienced (struck "experienced", as we'll never agree on what "an experienced user" is; any uninvolved user in good standing could probably be trusted to do this) users (possibly admins?) who are in good standing (we'll never agree on what "good standing" is, either) will research the matter, and they will certify the case if they feel that the issues are serious enough to warrant a desysopping case. If the case is not appropriately certified in one week, the case will be closed as stale. If the case is properly certified, the case will proceed.
4. The discussion will run for two weeks. If a supermajority (67%) (changing to a simple majority (51%) per suggestions in discussion; if you prefer the original number, or something different, please mention that in your comment) support desysopping, the admin will be desysopped by a bureaucrat or a steward, although the former admin may file an RfA at any time.

I expect that this proposal will run into the "excessive bureaucracy" problem, seeing that it involves certifications. However, I'm including the certification because I do not want to see admins desysopped over petty issues, such as an isolated bad deletion or block. Also, in RFCU, the cases were certified by very involved editors, which is not fair, in my opinion. This proposal specifies that the case can only be certified by two experienced, completely uninvolved users. Remember that this is only a very rough draft and is open to major modifications, so if you can figure out a way to make this less bureaucratic while still preserving the "mob protection", please say so. Thanks, --Biblioworm 21:29, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Reforms will never work unless there is a reason for the reform. I understand that providing examples of bad admins who should be desysopped is a bit sensitive, but that's what has to happen. If there is a problem, please link to a discussion with an outline of the claims concerning an admin so others can evaluate whether a reform is needed, or whether there should be swifter retribution for people who try to grind down those who defend the encyclopedia. Johnuniq (talk) 21:49, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

The idea behind the introduction of a desysopping system is that the community will not be as afraid to make new admins, because they can take some comfort in the fact that the admin can be desysopped if s/he turns out to be worse than they thought. The lack of such a system is probably one of the main reasons why only near-perfect candidates pass RfA. Besides, a community-based desysopping system works for some other Wikipedias, so why can't it work for us? I sometimes think that we just make things hard for ourselves. By the way, click here if you want to see a current example of a questionable admin. The issue probably could have been resolved at a much faster pace if there had been a community desysopping system available. --Biblioworm 22:12, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

That's a well-known case which is the kind of thing that the community would have trouble deciding, and for exactly the same reasons that Arbcom has not yet taken any action. However, Arbcom has the issue well in hand and when the admin returns everything will proceed as quickly as is reasonable. Another case is here and it was quickly resolved by the admin effectively retiring. That's fine—we don't need heads on spikes. Johnuniq (talk) 22:37, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Here's the question—the only problem explicitly identified by Bioblioworm with desysopping through ArbCom is that it is "slow". Why is it necessarily to develop an entirely new process in order to jam through desysoppings rapidly? (And even the "slow" assertion is questionable. ArbCom cases that involve multiple issues, complicated situations, and – particularly – misconduct by multiple parties certainly take rather a long time to proceed to completion. But those complex situations are ones where we shouldn't be extracting one party to rush one sanction.)

In truth, we already have Step 1 and Step 2 of the above scheme, where Step 2 is filed with ArbCom. In situations where there is clearly-described misconduct by an administrator, the ArbCom has repeatedly demonstrated an ability to act swiftly. The ArbCom will desysop by motion. The ArbCom will desysop on the basis of clearly-established, evidence-driven consensus for that action at WP:AN. The ArbCom will desysop in absentia if an admin doesn't respond to proceedings. Simply filing a clearly-stated arbitration case against an administrator is often sufficient to trigger an under-a-cloud resignation (which has the same effect as desysopping).

A major problem is that few people can be bothered to sit down and do Step 1 properly. Gathering evidence and diffs takes time and effort. Editing evidence into a coherent narrative takes time and effort. That effort won't magically disappear with this new process (or ones like it). At least, I hope that it won't—having mob-driven desysoppings for no clearly-elucidated reason seems unlikely to increase the pool of willing adminship candidates.

Finally, making a good-faith attempt to consider alternative, less-drastic remedies takes time and effort. This last step is important but often neglected. Not every error or instance of misconduct actually requires or deserves desysopping. All too often a vocal minority demands desysopping. When they fail to get it, they blame the process. Sometimes the problem lies instead in their own expectations being out of sync with the community. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:42, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

• I find myself in sympathy with this proposal, although I would rather have a noticeboard where editors could bring concerns about administrators' conduct. One reason is that that would allow for issues to be raised with one part of the admins' actions without it being necessary to imply they were a net negative; another is that it would by being more ad hoc, more easily allow for resolutions short of threatening the admin with desysopping, and encourage broader participation by not being a formal vote. But I'm inclined to prefer non-bureaucratic and informal processes anyway, and that relates to the points about Arbcom. I share Biblioworm's concern about Arbcom being slow, and I don't share the confidence in Arbcom indicated in some responses above. I find Arbcom's procedures impenetrable and see it making decisions that in whole or in part I do not find helpful. I don't have much confidence in it at all at this point. And I believe Biblioworm is spot on: one of the problems with RfA is that editors fear sysopping is almost irrevocable. I recognize that his/her proposal is designed to minimize the risk of the mob attacking a diligent admin for being diligent, but I'd still rather see a more flexible process. Yngvadottir (talk) 23:27, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Support, all of the folks comments here were TL, so I DR skimmed over most of it, but I just wanted to say that this could work. Sometimes, certified users are needed for things, like desysopping. (Whether community driven or ArbCom-like, we just need a better desysopping process.) --AmaryllisGardener 23:33, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

And a big thank you to AmaryllisGardener for illustrating so succinctly what would be wrong with this proposed process. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 23:57, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

And a big thank you to TenOfAllTrades for illustrating so succinctly what is wrong with RfA's community. --AmaryllisGardener 00:00, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

That is not a reasonable response. You are supporting a scheme where you dismiss a few paragraphs as TLDR—that perfectly illustrates why a community-based system of attacking admins is not needed. Someone would post a wall of diffs with assertions, and passers-by would support action against the admin without considering whether the diffs actually support the assertions, and without considering the rebuttals that have been made. Johnuniq (talk) 01:11, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Let me say that "skimmed" would be a more appropriate word, because I read all of it, I just read through it quickly. I don't know why I used TLDR. Anyway, thanks for explaining. --AmaryllisGardener 01:18, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support. I was under the impression that this is pretty much how things already worked. We decide issues by community consensus; there is no reason that a policy-backed community consensus to de-admin would not be honored. bd2412 T 01:22, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Support, although I think a 50%+1 majority should be sufficient to desysop. Everyking (talk) 02:11, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Support, though I think that the specific percentage should be loosened a little, similar to how it is for an RfA. Such a discussion in effect would be a required reconfirmation RfA. Something like approximately 50% to 70% should require 'crats to weigh arguments and/or depending on the circumstances have a bureaucrat discussion to close. With percentages outside those ranges pretty much a rubberstamp keep or desysop case. Admins will make enemies and we want to avoid loosing admins that are willing to make difficult closes that might make enemies. At the same time we should be able to deal with admins that have taken too much of a partisan view and abusing there admin powers to strength one side even if they have a bunch of like minded supporters. PaleAqua (talk) 02:47, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

  I also think that an admin voluntarily resigning during the course of such a discussion should be allowed to bring it to a close immediately, though of course such resignation would be seen as "under a cloud". PaleAqua (talk) 02:52, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose Arbcom desysops people plenty when it is really needed. Admins simply doing their job accumulate people who resent them. Hold a vote and everyone they ever blocked will come out with pitchforks and thinly veiled alternative reasons. An admin could not do their job under a popular vote system because enforcing the consensus of the community is an unpopular job.

  Who are these admins that need to be desysopped but the present system is failing? Where is the problem that this is trying to solve? I took a 3 year break recently and when I left there were 4 admins that I thought should not be. When I came back 3 were desysopped and 1 had cleaned up her act. I say the current system works.

  I would support an administrative conduct noticeboard where issues can be reported and discussed, the discussion there could be used to indicate to arbcom if the community wants the matter pursued. Also there is no rule against admins being blocked, topic banned, interaction banned or just plain banned by the consensus of the community. Chillum 04:01, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support - The community needs a vehicle by which the community, not Arbcom, may desysop administrators in whom the community no longer has confidence. Furthermore, I strongly endorse the percentage !votes proposed by PaleAqua above: a simple 50% + 1 should be sufficient to desysop any admin. An admin who cannot maintain at least 50% +1 support has clearly lost the confidence of the community. Requiring a super majority of 67% (or 66 and 2/3 %?) should not be necessary -- that would imply that only 33% of the community still has confidence in the admin, a ridiculously low percentage. A 67% super majority to desysop turns the idea of a minimum of 70% support to be promoted to admin on its head. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 04:19, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Support the community elects admins and the community should be allowed to remove admins as well. Even if this proposal fails, I would recommend the creation of a page where users can recommend that an admin be given a non–binding vote of no confidence. Mellowed Fillmore (talk) 04:42, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• I think the proposal is too early to support or oppose but I would need to know much more about what we determine to be "uninvolved and experienced editors". Admins but themselves into conflict all the time. If everyone followed the rules and got along and there were no disagreements to be had, then there would be a significantly reduced number of admins. Having any 3 people on the same page, whether they're involved or indirectly is way too low a threshold to trigger a two week community de-sysopping process. Rather than uninvolved and experienced editors, why don't we have bureaucrats review cases filed and they would determine if it should go to a community lead process. Mkdw 06:58, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• I would generally support something like this, although I'd prefer a 70-75% rate for desysop (i.e., a mirror RFA). WilyD 11:03, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• @WilyD: As I noted above, a 70–75% affirmative vote to desysop translates as residual community confidence in the admin of only 25–30%. We require minimum community support of 70% to promote an editor to administrator. Do we really want to keep an admin in whom community confidence has fallen to 30% or even less? Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 14:51, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Well, until it actually happens a few times, it's a bit tough to guess what the right choice is, of course. Requests for de-adminship is unlikely to be a random sample of the community (much like Requests for adminship), which makes it hard to guess. If you think of it as yes/no, perhaps 50/50 makes sense. But in a more Misplaced Pages-esque decision space with "no consensus" in the middle, there's also space for "no consensus" to de-admin. It's just a guess, and would be worth tinkering with if people are unhappy with the results. WilyD 16:03, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Wily, I agree that it's a guess, but the historical pattern at RfA has been a high percentage of participation by existing admins, and I would expect that pattern to continue in a vastly more controversial community desysop RfC. If a majority, or even a substantial plurality of admins !vote to remove, the subject admin is a goner; likewise, if a strong majority of admins continue to support, removal is unlikely. Recent re-confirmation RfAs have shown that even controversial admins usually retain community confidence of 60+%. I would expect that attaining super majorities of 67 to 75% for desysopping would be be virtually impossible to obtain short of the admin's conduct being outrageously egregious and/or a complete meltdown, in which case the admin is more likely to resign than wait for the community's axe to fall. Bottom line: getting a 50% +1 majority to agree to remove an admin will not be an easy result to obtain, and getting a super majority of 67 to 75% would be virtually impossible. At the end of the day, this is about accountability, and if an admin no longer has support of 50% of the community, he or she needs to be held accountable. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 16:35, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• For your information, I've made a few changes to the proposal, which are written in small print. --Biblioworm 16:38, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Well, both of us are merely guessing; neither of us knows how likely people are to show up and support or oppose a desysoping, or with what standards. I think it's wiser to take whatever guess, and make it clear that it's subject to change if the choice is wrong, so people aren't needlessly intransegient in the future. As long as the choice is reasonable, it shouldn't impact whether the proposal is endorsed. WilyD 17:53, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• I don't support the proposal as stands, but I would really like to see a community de-sysopping procedure. There are two significant issues with the current proposal - 1) It's a highly negative process. RfA is difficult for individuals when people start to oppose - this is asking for multiple burnout retirements, whether or not the final decision is for a desysop. Perhaps removing comments from any such vote might improve that, but we should be taking into account the real person behind the keyboard in any discussions here. Even better would be securePoll, if one could be set up. 2) The "starting criteria" are excessively wooly. How long should discussions discussions be to be considered extensive? What time period should they be over? How many events should they cover? How many people should have been involved?

  That said, I do like the idea of the "gatekeeper" being two uninvolved users. I'd suggest three, because a "hung jury" is less likely. There's a balance to be found, and I think this proposal is a step in the right direction. Worm(talk) 11:28, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Definitely would support a due process. Like any other action on WP, if there is a consensus to do something then this is no different. VegasCasinoKid (talk) 12:12, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Support in general, but I like the idea of 50%+1 rather than supermajority to prove the admin has lost the community's confidence. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 15:02, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

  Also, 3 would be better than two, yes. Not more than that. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:52, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support with caveats; I think you need more than two "experienced" users to certify (three? five?). Also, I'd suggest a minimum edit-count for those voting, in a similar way to ArbCom elections (although perhaps not as onerous as that - min. one month & 50 edits?) otherwise I can predict votes being overrun with socks which is just a waste of everyone's time. I'd also agree with 67% - at least - admins make enemies, even when they're doing their jobs correctly. This is especially true of anyone working in controversial area (I/P, fringe medicine, etc etc). Black Kite (talk) 15:13, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Black Kite, I agree that the certification panel should include three (or five) members not two. I regularly draft closely-held corporate and partnership documents, and it is never a good idea to have a decision-making board with an even number of votes: it invites the inevitable deadlock. I also agree that only registered users should be permitted to participate, and with the further caveat that participants must have been auto-confirmed before the case was initiated. On the other hand, I disagree that a 67 to 75% super majority should be required for removal; that translates into continued community support of only 25 to 33% -- and that's a ringing vote of "no confidence" under any circumstances. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:58, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• My point was that 67/75 might be required (instead of 50) to offset the "this nasty admin once blocked me / refused my request / wouldn't block the idiot I was edit-warring with / protected an article in the wrong version / etc. etc., despite the fact that it was completely warranted" type of oppose. Even the best admins will, by the very nature of their work, have gathered a list of editors that don't like them. Black Kite (talk) 20:10, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support, at this point I'd support pretty much any suggestion for a community desysop process, no matter what the details. --Floquenbeam (talk) 15:16, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Support It may need some work, but this is at least a good starting point. Intothatdarkness 16:39, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Question what is the desysop procedure for other (larger) wikipedias? Dusti 18:20, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Proposal is off topic for this page

This is the talk page for our process for making new admins. A proposal that brings about a new process and an entirely new class of users need to be discussed in a more public venue like the village pump. This is the talk page for RfA, I don't see it as a relevant place to product a new process to remove admin access.

This venue does not provide the wide attention of the community needed to create a consensus significant enough to enact a change of this magnitude. Chillum 04:27, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm just getting a general opinion right now, as I'm not quite ready to put this at the proposal page. (There's still some things that need to be worked out, such as the percentage that would be required to desysop.) When everything is smoothed out, I'll take this to the village pump. However, I could create a subpage for this in my userspace and have the discussion continue there. --Biblioworm 04:39, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Fair enough, it is at least tangentially related to RfA. Chillum 04:58, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Yes, WT:RfA is definitely the wrong venue, but I support the proposal in principle because I think it's high time some major RfCs were started on the topic of community desysoping which I broadly support anyway. If the proposal gets laughed out (as one of mine did recently), no harm done - come up with another. It would be good to keep the community on its toes for a while on such an important issue. Sooner or later one idea will gain traction and after a bit of the inevitable tweaking, the community will agree on something. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 14:22, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

What is an "experienced user in good standing"?

Since this wording may appear to be vague in the proposal, I want to obtain some opinions on what constitutes an "experienced user in good standing". I would define an "experienced user" to be someone with 3-6 months of active editing, and about 1,500-2,000 edits. A user in good standing would be someone who is not currently under any sanctions and has not been under any for at least 3 months. --Biblioworm 16:43, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I would say an "experienced user" is a user who's been here 6+ months with 4,000+ edits. just my 2¢. --AmaryllisGardener 16:46, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Biblioworm, under your criteria, I wouldn't be an experienced user in good standing, so I'd have to do a NIMBY oppose. :-) Any suggestions on how to loosen it without going to a straight edit-count/time criteria? --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:48, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• I'm going to oppose. An experienced user in good standing? What, is this a new rights group or is it arbitrary or ...? We already have autoconfirmed users. If you arbitrarily set this, what means will be in place to prevent an ever increasing benchmark of the subjective assessment of "experienced" and "good standing"? Why not apply this metric as a suffrage benchmark for RfA? If not, why not? The further and further we get away from the principle of "the 💕 that anyone can edit" the further down into the pit of hell we go. Either you respect all editors who have not proven themselves to be a malicious entity on the project, or you don't. If you don't, then you are opposed to the very foundation on which Misplaced Pages was founded. --Hammersoft (talk) 17:46, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
  • I've struck "experienced" in the proposal, as we'll never agree on what exactly constitutes an experienced user. Besides, multiple users would have to certify any case, so they would probably keep each other in check. Now, we need to decide what a user in good standing is... --Biblioworm 18:03, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
    • We'll never agree on 'good standing' either. I think good standing, at a maximum, is equivalent to autoconfirmed and not blocked. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:19, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
      • In the interests of simplicity, I've struck both. I've also added a note that admins could take on the role of certifiers. --Biblioworm 23:20, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

A "user in good standing" is either very vague or it is is a new class of user that needs to have a selection process and... a removal process. Sound familiar? I suppose we will have a RfUIGS board to vote them in, and some then people will start to disagree with them and demand a system for their removal. Who chooses which UIGS are used? If one UIGS says it is bunk but 2 UIGS say it is valid is it a question of who gets there first like a race?

Any solution that simply shifts trust around will not work as we will be in the same situation we started in.

I say anything that it worthy of losing your admin bit is worthy of a block. The community just needs to be willing to block admins. Any admin who unblocks themselves will lose their bit. Any admin that reverses a block that was the result of a community consensus will likely lose their bit.

Arbcom can desysop, the community can block and even ban an admin. If we can come to a consensus to desysop then we can come to a consensus to restrain poorly behaved admins. Admins are not special and the community needs to stop making them a special case. Chillum 18:05, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Comment neither supporting nor opposing. I support the idea in general, but I cannot support the proposal as now stated. Selection of uninvolved editors will be problematic at best, because even individuals who have had no previous involvement with the admin in question may be perhaps involved in some other way, such as perhaps the admin engaging in dubious conduct with an editor that individual likes on-wiki or off-wiki. Without a fairly clear idea how such people would be selected or drafted, and I might prefer drafting or at least requested to take part from a list of theoretically eligible editors, I can't see how this would have much chance of success. John Carter (talk) 19:07, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• As stated above, I think having only two random users review a case to trigger a community de-sysopping process is too ambiguous and could too easily be misused or abused. Based upon some of the RFA's I've seen, 3-6 months experience would not be remotely enough time for someone to know whether or not a sysop was abusing their administrative privileges. I believe there should either be an appointed committee to review submitted cases, or it should be given to an existing group that already has community support such as bureaucrats or even other administrators who are appointed by community consensus. Mkdw 21:10, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

This is just a version of WP:RFC/U

For all the good intentions here, this really just works out to a version of WP:RFC/U..with teeth. It would be part of dispute resolution, two or more people need to certify it, and it remains open for two weeks (instead of four). Sound familiar? We're about to decommission WP:RFC/U in a landslide and landmark decision for what was previously an important part of the project. Now we're going to replace it with what is essentially a clone, but this time with teeth? Ummm... --Hammersoft (talk) 20:06, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Could admins take on the role of certifiers?

I know there will be objection to this idea, but I wonder if uninvolved admins could be the certifiers for a desysopping case. I'm proposing this because "uninvolved users" might be a point of concern when this proposal is formally proposed, as the community might worry that any user, newbies included, could certify a case. To avoid this issue, do you think the certifiers should be admins? (Then again, we'd be defeating the entire purpose of creating this, as this process is supposed to advance the idea that "adminship is no big deal".) --Biblioworm 23:20, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• Nope nope nope nope. This has been thought of before, and soundly rejected because then the idea that admins are a self enforcing cabal comes right forward. Want to desysop an admin? Well, you've got to get two admins to agree with you before it can even go to a vote. It just doesn't fly, and won't fly. See, the vast majority of people agree there needs to be a desysopping process. The problem is the devil is in the details, and nobody has come up with any system that isn't fraught with serious issues. --Hammersoft (talk) 23:36, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

By the way, I looked at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_de-adminship#Proposed_processes and found two processes right off that sound very similar to what you proposed above. Both are from 2005...9 years ago:

1. This one, in which ten users needed to certify for it to go to a vote.
2. Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_de-adminship/Proposal_2#Petition, in which ten users plus three admins had to certify for it to go vote (and users had suffrage requirements).

All this has happened before, and will happen again. Everything old is new, everything new is old. We keep returning to the same proposals, and they keep being rejected for fundamental and/or grave structural issues. --Hammersoft (talk) 23:48, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Refined version

I've refined the proposal a little, in accordance with some suggestions from the users giving opinions on this. Does it look a bit better now?

1. Before a case request is filed, the issues must have been discussed at other venues, such as the admin's talk page and ANI. The issues also cannot be minor. For a case to proceed, the admin must have displayed repeated poor judgement, or have committed a particularly serious violation.
2. If all the requirements are met, the concerned user may file a case request.
3. After the case request is filed, three uninvolved users will research the matter, and they will certify the case if they feel that the issues are serious enough to warrant a desysopping case. If the case is not appropriately certified in one week, the case will be closed as stale. If the case is properly certified, the case will proceed.
4. The discussion will run for two weeks. If a simple majority (51%) support desysopping, the admin will be desysopped by a bureaucrat or a steward, although the former admin may file an RfA at any time. (This part of the proposal is still open to modification; for example, should there be a discretionary range?)

--Biblioworm 23:57, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

There are several things that stand out here as being serious structural issues. There are requirements that

1. Prior to the case being brought, it must have been discussed at other venues. Who decides if it has or not?
2. The issues must not be minor. Who is the arbiter of what is minor and not minor?
3. The admin must have displayed repeated poor judgment. Who decides what is poor judgment and what is not?
4. Once those requirements are met, the case may be filed. Who decides if all the requirements are met?
5. A case can be certified by three users. Are they the ones that make the above decisions?
6. Do we checkuser all the certifiers to ensure there is no sockpuppetry going on?
7. The certifiers must be uninvolved. How do we determine that? The term 'uninvolved' has been embroiled in controversy before. Unfortunately, you're going to have to define 'uninvolved'.
8. The certifiers are expected to do research into the case. What constitutes research?
9. Is there an evidence page where people can submit items as evidence? Who decides what is admissible evidence and what is not?
10. What if three users certify, but three oppose, stating that the case is frivolous?

The whole notion sounds promising...until you look into the details of it. If you're asking me to support the idea that we need a desysop process separate from ArbCom, sure. If you're asking me to support the proposal as worded? The proposal, as is, is empty of significant details to know if this system would work or not. I'm being asked to buy a car without knowing anything about the car, other than it's a car. --Hammersoft (talk) 00:03, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Please continue discussion at User:Biblioworm/Desysopping proposal

The people who have commented on this thread have brought several issues to light, and therefore, I do not believe that this is quite ready to be formally presented at the village pump. I have copied this proposal to User:Biblioworm/Desysopping proposal, where I will work on it and try to incorporate the suggestions that the commenters have given. Please continue discussion of this proposal on the relevant talk page. (You may want to watchlist the page if you're interested in keeping track of the changes.) Thanks, --Biblioworm 00:21, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

A very radical proposal - RfAs without an oppose section

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

So, let me begin by saying that I know this proposal will likely be seen as crazy and will gain no traction, but I just might as well put it out there.
A "toxic environment" is one commonly referenced reason why RfA is a broken process. This could be somewhat solved by implementing RfAs without an oppose section, and candidates would be elected based on how many support !votes they get. It would work something like this:
There would be an admin election once every three months. On an individual RfA, there would be no "Oppose" section. Rather, there would be a "Comments" section, where users could post general comments and possibly concerns they have about the candidate. If you oppose the candidate, you simply do not list yourself in the "Support" section. After the election has ended, the candidates who got the most support !votes (maybe the top five, ten, etc.) will become admins. This may fix the "toxicity" problem, and perhaps make RfAs a bit less stressful, as users cannot post "ridiculous oppose !votes". Instead, they simply leave comments listing their concerns, and if !voters are convinced by those concerns, they can simply choose to not support. (As a side note, this may also indirectly fix the WP:NOTNOW problem, because new users would have to wait for the formal election rather than being able to post an RfA the moment they register.) --Biblioworm 02:07, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I see no reason to pit candidates against each other. Candidacies should pass or fail on their own merits. GraniteSand (talk) 02:11, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Not sure that having a large number of friends and userpage watchers is necessarily the best prerequisite or qualification for adminship. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 02:16, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

The underlying "problem" this would seem intended to address would be a lack of trust in the bureaucrats, since it seems to imply that they do not already weigh "ridiculous oppose !votes" the appropriate amount. But we do trust the bureaucrats to ignore ridiculous oppose rationales, don't we? And without numbers, we'd end up having to trust them all the more. Dekimasuよ! 02:39, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

It's meant to address the toxic atmosphere more than credit given to lame opposes. But, remember, with Jack McBarn, those complaints about IP editing 7 years ago were mostly in the comments, not the oppose votes, so I'm not sure it would help. That said, a trial wouldn't be a bad idea, but I'm not sure how we would run it. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 04:19, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• Comment (i.e. oppose) Interesting idea but... this seems to trade the real concern of griefing opposers ( which seem in part to be dealt with given the newer policing of questionable comments ) for a battle between candidates. There would be the natural inclination if someone particularly liked one of the candidates ( say they often !voted similar, or were in similar wiki-ideological camps ) to smear the other candidates. And those that would cause problems in the current system could still do the same in the new comments section. The comments section would in practice be an oppose section. I can see such elections being much more off putting then the current system. PaleAqua (talk) 04:11, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• Comment. I agree with PaleAqua. While oppose discussions can get toxic, they are necessary because adminship and the tools are heavy responsibilities, and careful discernment must be used, as with any job interview/hiring. Not having oppose options in an RfA would be like not having Delete !vote options in AfDs. Softlavender (talk) 04:38, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• LOL I am intrigued by the idea of turning RFA into a classroom popularity contest. It would be absolutely hilarious Wikitheater to watch supposed grown-ups campaign against each other to finish in the monthly Top 5, with Adminship as a prize to be won carnival-style. Townlake (talk) 06:21, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• As the others have said, the only real difference from the current process in terms of what you intended to fix is that people wouldn't bother putting the word "Oppose" in front of their comments. Otherwise, it would create a ton of other problems, and the "election" style is frankly ridiculous. Thanks for the effort you've put into coming up with these proposals to fix this (supposedly) increasingly dysfunctional part of Misplaced Pages, but maybe it's time to give it a little rest. ansh666 06:39, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• Comment Ill conceived. First of all, WP:NOTNOW isn't a problem, it is a minor irritation easily dealt with. As for "toxicity" caused by oppose votes, this notion ignores the fact that over-rated candidates nominated by over-eager and frequently inadequately researched nomination statements from certain high profile Admin. nominators attract an implausible number of gratuitous support votes even before a single question or solid bit of vetting has been carried out on the candidate. We already have enough "populist" selections without turning RfA into a beauty contest. Leaky Caldron 11:18, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• Comment Wherever you set the bar, either some ill-qualified candidates will be above it or some well-qualified candidates will fall below it. Very probably both. The role of the crats in weeding out inappropriate !votes would be undermined. As others have said, this would be a popularity contest. And the suggested "comments" section gives just as much scope for "toxicity". --Stfg (talk) 11:49, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• Comment interesting idea. A possible refinement We split RFA into a two stage process, say the first few days are comment only - kind of like asking "do you think I'm ready for RFA?" this would allow the WP:NOTNOW type candidates an early and dignified exit. After that period it could move into RFA proper. --Salix alba (talk): 12:06, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

  We already have several "preparatory" venues for aspiring administrators, most of which are linked to on the RfA page. GraniteSand (talk) 13:40, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• Comment. Many people are saying that this would turn RfA into a popularity/beauty contest, which does have some truth in it. However, I guess who say this may consider going along and ridiculing the ArbCom election style, since it works essentially the same way. (It's worked fine so far, hasn't it?) Anyway, I don't even fully support this idea myself, but I just wanted to see what other people thought about. And, yes, after I finish up my desysopping proposal and propose it at the village pump, I'm finished with all things RfA-reform related for a good while (permanently, perhaps?). --Biblioworm 15:42, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• Not at all similar to Arbcom, since there, there is generally a set amount of members with a definite tenure, unlike administrators of which there is no limit to either. ansh666 18:37, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• I'm with Ansh, this is a silly comparison. Put the shovel down Biblio. Townlake (talk) 18:39, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• A very amusing proposal - that's the most polite thing I can say about it. The proposal rather reminds me of the recent referendum on the independence of Crimea. What Putin and people around him realized that you don't have to give the people the option of voting "no" on a particular proposal - that, of course, ensures the 100% "yes" vote outcome. Quite brilliant, if you think about it. Not even North Korea has thought of that, and during the "elections" there it is still, at least theoretically, possible to vote against the government's candidates. But I see that some folks here took Mr Putin's lesson to heart. Nice. Nsk92 (talk) 16:10, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
  • @Nsk92: "Nice" would be the word used to describe the person who starts comparing someone to Putin for making a good-faith proposal to remove the toxicity they see in the RfA process. G S Palmer (talk • contribs) 16:43, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• Comment - I'm not here to rain on anyone's good-faith suggestions to improve RfA's processes or its atmospherics, and all proposals should be considered on their merits. That having been said, the problem of a "toxic" environment will trump whatever process reforms are proposed and adopted -- if we allow it to do so. Traditionally, the community has permitted free-wheeling RfA discussion and debate about the editing history, merits and potential problems of candidates, and the community has allowed relatively wide-ranging latitude in making those comments, more so than anywhere else on-wiki. Undoubtedly some members of the community have abused that privilege by using RfA discussions to vindictively settle old scores, while others have simply nitpicked and exaggerated the perceived flaws seemingly to derail a candidacy. Expectations of perfection are misguided; it is not hard to find a half dozen mistakes or snappish answers in 15,000 or 20,000 edits of virtually any editor. What we need in RfA discussions is balance: mature, temperate discussion of the candidate's positives and negatives -- not exaggerations or intemperate language calculated to start a stampede of pile-ons, and not personal attacks on the candidate's character that would get an editor blocked anywhere else. I might also add that we need to protect the opinions of !voters who voice their good-faith "oppose" rationales temperately, and in a civil manner. I can think of at least two recent occasions where younger members of the community attempted to shout down minority !voters who expressed their good-faith "oppose" rationales temperately and with civility. What are needed are mature discussion participants, who are mindful that we are almost always discussing RfA candidates who are productive and valued members of the community, not criminals to be eviscerated because of some perceived flaw. I might also note that some of the biggest defenders of the current RfA process are also some of those discussion contributors who have a history of pushing the envelope in their comments and criticisms of candidates -- and ironically, are also some of the biggest proponents of greater civility in other discussions. It would be nice if those individuals could apply that same level of razor-edged wit and criticism to their own behavior during RfA discussions and elsewhere. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 17:00, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• "If you oppose the candidate, you simply do not list yourself in the 'Support' section." So essentially, this proposal boils down to renaming the "Oppose" section to "Comments". ‑Scottywong| comment _ 17:33, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
• Comment RfA subjects a person to a level of toxicity yes, be being an admin exposes you to a lot of that. Admins need to be comfortable with people criticizing them. Chillum 17:51, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• Sure, administrators need to be able to handle heated discussion, Chillum, but there is absolutely no reason why the community should tolerate baseless or even exaggerated attacks and obvious attempts to stampede pile-on !votes during RfAs. RfA candidates have very limited leeway to defend themselves during an RfA, and most of the participating community has recognized that. More often than not, the candidate has virtually no control over what is written, and little ability to affect the RfA outcome for the better. Your "trial by ordeal" theory of RfA is not exactly invalid, but it is also an imperfect paradigm. Frankly, incivility, exaggerated criticism and borderline personal attacks should have no place anywhere within Misplaced Pages, including RfA, and as a serving administrator of some standing, I hope you would recognize and accept that. I also think it odd that you are such a strong advocate of "trial by ordeal" for new admin candidates, but steadfastly oppose any and all proposals for community-based desysopping. Shouldn't serving admins be able to handle criticism during a community admin review at least as well as RfA candidates? Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:45, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• INTENSELY strong comment: The candidate is a known vandal, with a history of abusive behavior, several threads about him at WP:AN/I, and most likely clinical. See the problem? Not being allowed to say "oppose" changes nothing. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:06, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

• Comment I'm all in favour of improvement to RfA, I really am, that's why I began what became the largest single reform project and garnered Wales' support with his famous 'horrible and broken process' statement. A "toxic environment" is one which is however commonly misunderstood by today's new proponents for change. Obviously they weren't around four or five years ago but they should do some research before coming up with 'new' ideas and maintaining that RfAs are now still seriously flawed. By comparison with what Dennis and I* and many others went through on our RfAs, today's candidates practically have a walk in the park. No need to make it any easier now. *At least one of the admins who oppposed my RfA has since been desysoped. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 19:29, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 22 December 2014

This edit request to Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

I ask request for administrator access. I would appreciate it a lot. Devinnickols9 (talk) 19:42, 22 December 2014 (UTC)D.A.N.

You need to read the instructions at the top of the page on how to request adminship. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:44, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 23 December 2014

This edit request to Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship/Programmer786

Programmer786 (talk) 16:36, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

This is not the place to nominate yourself for adminship. Also, I suggest you read WP:RFAADVICE and WP:NOTNOW before starting an RFA, because at this early stage in your editing career it has virtually no chance of succeeding. G S Palmer (talk • contribs) 16:40, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Brand new RFA

Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship/EdLeo99 needs attention by those more experienced than myself. What is usually done when a brand new user nominates themselves for adminship like this? Should it be transcluded here at all, or just deleted, or what? Everymorning talk 01:26, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

This needs to be closed or perhaps even deleted as an obvious case of WP:NOTNOW. -Ad Orientem (talk) 01:32, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Deleted; not even worth keeping around. The user's second edit was making that page so we all know what the outcome of any transclusion would be. Wizardman 01:45, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Editor has posted their age places, so I'll email Oversight...sigh... ansh666 02:27, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

So silly season starts early

Can someone remind me why it makes sense to allow just anyone to nominate themselves? The NOTNOW editors nominate themselves, perhaps well-meaning, and get their feelings hurt. Couldn't this be locked down to only allow admins to transclude nominations and let them internally preemptively close noms? I sincerely doubt good-faith editors could think the RfA process is too cloistered especially when the community reliably savages even the more-accomplished among us. Chris Troutman (talk) 16:56, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

It's a nice idea, Chris, but we would only be accused from some quarters of lining our pockets with even more power.

What gets me arriving at the edge of AGFing is the total disregard of all the advice and links at every step of the self nomination process. What I said here might sound hurtful to an overly enthusiastic and relatively intelligent 14 year old (and I wouldn't do it), but one who aspires to the maturity and self-confidence of the current candidate isn't gong to be let off so lightly. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 17:09, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Like Kudpung said, nobody would be happy with admins having any more power than they do now, even if it's rejecting users with less than 100 edits' requests to transclude their RfA that's doomed to fail. --AmaryllisGardener 17:16, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

This may sound a bit callous, but someone who's hell-bent on ignoring the giant notice – copied below – that appears when editing the RfA page (as to, for example, transclude a new RfA) has probably earned a mild rebuke.

Hi, and thanks for offering your services as an administrator or nominator. Please read Administrators, the Guide to requests for adminship, and Advice for RfA candidates before proceeding with a nomination. Adminship is not for new or inexperienced users. Candidates who are successful have usually made thousands of edits to articles and housekeeping tasks. Administrators need to know and understand how Misplaced Pages handles deletion and copyright concerns, and other policies, and they must be able to show that they can exercise sound judgment in awkward situations.

Applications from editors without considerable experience are usually quickly declined as premature or even deleted before they begin. If you are unsure if an RfA nomination is reasonable, please ask an admin or an established user for advice. There is also a list of experienced editors willing to consider nominating candidates.

As well, note that fully protecting the RfA page will potentially affect credible candidates in negative ways, as well. Candidates would no longer be able to directly control when their own RfAs went live; they'd be left waiting – sometimes minutes, sometimes hours – for their editprotected request to go through. It might mean that a candidate isn't available to respond to early questions or comments (which often have a disproportionate effect on the success or failure of an RfA). The candidate might not be on hand to immediately repair formatting or other problems that only became apparent after their RfA is transcluded. In the extreme, the candidate wouldn't able to un-transclude his own RfA, either due to the aforementioned formatting/structural issues, or as a 'self-defense' withdrawal of a clearly-failing RfA in lieu of pile-on.

(And of course we'd have to deal with the utterly ridiculous but extraordinarily shrill and time-sucking objections that this is some sort of coup by power-mad admins. It would become a permanent, irrational 'talking point' among certain perennial anti-admin timewasters and trolls.) TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:45, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

• Well meaning Admins. hell bent on interfering further in what is a community-based area need to take a look at themselves or simply keep their genuine AGF nose out of this. There is ample guidance and warnings and fools proceeding beyond the final warning banner harm no one but themselves. WP:NOTNOW is there for a good reason - it works. Leaky Caldron 19:21, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
• I see no reason to get too worked up over this and tend to agree with Leaky_caldron. NOTNOW is there to cover situations like this, and I see no evidence that it is insufficient to its purpose. Yesterday's well intentioned silliness was just a hiccup and it was dealt with pretty expeditiously. I defer to the old rule that if it aint broke, don't fix it. -Ad Orientem (talk) 20:02, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
• Agree with Ten above. Inexperienced editors who nominate themselves despite the stern and loud warnings against it are asking for what inevitably comes next. This harsh but clear system is much more effective than having admins field "how about now? how about now? now now now now?" questions every several days from underqualified, overenthusiastic candidates. Townlake (talk) 20:14, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
• I don't mean to sound harsh but if you're going to nominate yourself and ignore every warning and guidance here then you deserve the lack of AGF and more of the NOTNOWs. –Davey2010 20:26, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
• Chris, that would be an overreaction. These RfA don't pop up at an overwhelming pace and they can be SNOW/NOTNOW closed quite easily. Mellowed Fillmore (talk) 23:49, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Proposal: Statute of limitations

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I propose a statue of limitations for one year on any candidate's actions. If anyone presents some action taken by the candidate more than one year ago, it should immediately be struck from the record and not considered in closing, or ideally, voting. This recognizes that a candidate that wasn't good in the past might be a better person now, and would make RfA discussions much more civil with crap not being dredged up from the distant past. Whether this should be one year, or something longer of more recent, of course, is something for discussion, and even so, exceptions should be permitted on a case-by-case basis, such as an editor that hasn't recently been very active. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 00:25, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

A hard time threshold sounds unwise, to me. Surely, whether how and on what schedule an individual might change depends on the individual. When judging someone's character, people ought to be free to exercise their judgement about how to exercise their judgement. --Pi zero (talk) 00:31, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Well, what brings this up is largely Jack McBarn's, who had to deal with a whole bunch of people raising a stink about how he edited as an IP is 2006 or something like that. This type of thing is what scares people from RfA. While Jack is a specific example, as a matter of general principle, this type of stale stuff should be kept out of these. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 00:39, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

While I'm not sure what definite time we should set, we definitely need a way to keep !voters from dragging up diffs from many months or years before. Some candidates may even hear things like: "Oppose. When you were a newb, you made this terrible mistake, and I can't support people who have done that." Of course, some new Wikipedians learn very quickly, and are most unlikely to make the same mistake again. In any case, I've been drawing up some new proposals. In fact, I'm thinking of a very radical proposal that would eliminate "Opposes" completely. There would be admin elections at set times of the year, and the ones who get the most support !votes become admins. However, there would be a "Discussion" section, where people could discuss the candidate and any concerns they may have. Doing something like this would really take a good deal of the toxicity out of the process. --Biblioworm 01:27, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

I might support a rule restricting users from citing issues 2+ years old, but 1+ years seems a little strict. --AmaryllisGardener 01:36, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

I oppose any set rule. It all depends on the severity of the "crime." If somebody went completely berserk 366 days ago, it is relevant. You really cannot wiki-legislate something like this. It is common sense that people evaluating the RfA need to be the judge of each case on its own merits. We have too many rules and bureaucracy already and do not need more, like calling "foul" because somebody brought out some skeleton from the closet, no matter how dusty. —Gaff 03:31, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

• I do not share your confidence in the judgemental skills of some of the !voting pool frankly. As to calling foul to dusty skeletons, sometimes the !voter bringing them should get severely boomeranged. It entirely depends on the motivations of the exhumation, if you get me. Irondome (talk) 03:41, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

I proposed a similar idea amongst some other suggestions a while back I seem to recall. I cant remember its fate or my exact words. Cant even remember the thread now. I would support an "unreasonable period" in any wording on this. The problem is quantifying it in a specific time period. Let the community chew on the "reasonable" bone. It provides an entree to the idea which may be more acceptable for a more powerful discussion. It brings up the idea above, that a newbie error made 6 years ago should be treated with the contempt it deserves. Maybe then the community can decide on an actual time limit definition based on this very strong weakness in RfA Irondome (talk) 01:46, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Actions are a very broad class, why would we want to end up with only this:

Support - Thought they were an admin already, has been active in FA's, AFD's and vandal fighting for 5 years the last year. ~~~~

— xaosflux 02:01, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

LOL. Good point. OPs idea could be reworded very effectively. Irondome (talk) 02:04, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

It's not always bad to bring up past problems, but it's better done in the form of questions, so that the candidate can then demonstrate how that problem no longer applies, or what he/she learned from it. A compromise would be that problems dating back past a certain time couldn't be used as decline reasons until after the candidate is asked about them and has had a chance to reply. That should cut down on pile-ons. —Anne Delong (talk) 02:11, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

• That has merit. Irondome (talk) 02:16, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Contrary to popular opinion, raising a concern is not the same as being uncivil. This proposal approaches critical levels of silliness. – Juliancolton |  05:32, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

• I am with Juliancolton on this one. I cannot support any sort of "statute of limitations" on what opposes can be based on. First, RfA is ultimately about about trust and you cannot legislate trust by placing artificial restrictions of this kind; ultimately the issue of trust is up to the judgement of individual editors and RfA participants must be allowed to exercise their own judgement regarding whether they trust a particular candidate. This fundamental principle is much more important than preventing some unreasonable opposes. If an oppose !vote is based on a truly weak rationale (such as a minor transgression that happened a very long time ago), it will not generate significant follow-up 'oppose' !votes. Also, the context and the overall pattern are important. E.g. if an 'oppose' is based on some long-term problematic pattern of behavior by a particular candidate, older transgressions may be very relevant - it really depends on a specific case. Plus the severity of a particular transgression is an issue as well. An edit-warring block is one thing, but a pattern of tendentious editing is quite something else, and different RfA participants will (and must be allowed to) have different opinions about how long a period of substantively problem-free conduct must be in order to erase a particular transgression. Personally, I think that there are certain kinds of transgressions (e.g. real-world harassment of another editor) that permanently disqualify (at least in my eyes) an editor from becoming an admin. Nsk92 (talk) 12:46, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
• Very well said, Nsk92. I like Anne Delong's suggestion about using questions to invite candidates to deal with old worries, too. --Stfg (talk) 13:09, 1 December 2014 (UTC)
• Personally I would support there being a statute of limitations however I feel it must be more than 1 year, I think 2 or 3 would be sufficient. I know I have done things in my youth here in my first few years that I am not proud of and would affect me if I had run for adminship then but with the benefit of time, then something that happened in 2010 for example shouldn't really be considered in 2014 as a bar to running for adminship. The C of E God Save the Queen! (talk) 13:26, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

• But are those early blunders hints of a fundamental character flaw that would prevent you from wielding the mop with grace? If so, there's no way we should be compelled to overlook them; if not, any reasonable person will see that you've improved since then and assess your candidacy fairly. As it is, we very rarely see any legitimate opposition borne of years-old incidents that have not been reflected in recent editing patterns. A statue of wiki-limitations will only serve to make the voter's job harder, and in all likelihood lead to vast swaths of unsubstantiated claims, innumerable elephants in the room, widespread innuendo, and utter confusion. If a user's problematic past must be mandatorily swept under the rug to prevent people from discussing it, then that user should not be an admin. – Juliancolton |  14:06, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

• In the interest of fairness and neutrality, we should then add similar limitations to nominators and candidates wishing to point out their merits. If a candidate has done excellent work in Dispute Resolution, but hasn't edited WP:3O for 366 days, we should disregard that activity. The vandal-fighting he/she did as a newbie, before going on to article work, that shouldn't factor into our considerations, surely? And that GA he wrote in 2012 is, sadly, too old to demonstrate an understanding of article creation - what a shame. If we're going to impose this, it would be appropriate to judge all potential admins on only their last year's work, regardless of how long they've actually been here - this puts everyone, new editors and old hands, on a nice even playing field.

(That's an Oppose, by the way...) Yunshui _水 13:50, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Well, all of us can agree that we all know more about how things work now than we did a year ago. If the candidate has counter-vandalism experience from over a year ago, then I doubt they've forgotten the rules for it. And so, if the candidate made a bad mistake a year ago, they have probably learned from it. --AmaryllisGardener 13:57, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Oh, I'm far from favouring digging up diffs from 2007 where a candidate has misplaced a comma and shouting, "Look, they're clearly an ignoramus!". I just don't like the idea of a cut-off date beyond which all previous transgressions are automatically forgiven. I quite like Anne's suggestion, but really, I don't see a need for this - bureaucrats can already choose to disregard comments about ancient history in assessing Oppose votes, so there's no need for a specific rule that forbids bringing such events up for discussion. Yunshui _水 14:02, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

I agree with AmaryllisGardener on this. I semi-support this, but just 1 year seems a bit small - as AG said, 2 years would probably be a better idea. Also, I completely agree about another point that AG made - people know more about how things work now than they did a year ago. -Fimatic (talk | contribs) 00:29, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Oppose. While I respect that this was proposed in good faith, this a terrible idea. Valid reasons to oppose don't necessarily go away with the passage of time. Townlake (talk) 03:50, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose. Per Townlake not least of all because he has been around for long enough - years in fact - on RfA and adminship issues to have a far greater insight to their problems than those who are new to the grand perennial adminship debate. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 14:34, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose The candidate needs the community support to receive the tool sets. No statute of limitations should be set on whether they receive it or not. Mkdw 20:02, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose: briefly, an action more than a year ago may still be important in understanding that user's temperament and competence. Sadly some people don't learn from mistakes. BethNaught (talk) 20:12, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Good faith proposal, but not well informed in my view. Intothatdarkness 22:22, 23 December 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose - I support in principle the idea of not dredging up crap from way in the past to disqualify an admin candidate, as it's often done in bad faith. However, sometimes doing bad things in the past and responding constructively is a sign of a very good candidate. Conversely, a candidate who did something bad a long time ago and responded by flying into a blind rage and flipping tables and breaking stuff is a pretty good indicator that they will repeat that behaviour, however long ago it was. We still don't have a good desysopping process, so I prefer to have all potential issues on the table before we hand someone admin rights for life. We probably should very strongly discourage opposing a candidate on the basis of very minor transgressions in the very distant past, but in the current state of affairs I'm against making this a hard-coded cut-off rule. Ivanvector (talk) 19:19, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose - some pesky editor keeps their nose clean for 6 months/1 year just to get the tools? Stranger things have happened. GiantSnowman 19:21, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Present withdrawal option more clearly / only candidate can withdraw

The only mention here on the Project page about RfA Withdrawal is in the sentence "In the case of vandalism, improper formatting, or a declined or withdrawn nomination, non-bureaucrats may also delist a nomination." In light of withdrawal being such a common end result for RfAs, that's inadequate. Withdrawal is discussed in detail at Misplaced Pages:Guide to requests for adminship#Closure and candidates should (hopefully) have read that page carefully but the fact is that many of the candidates for whom withdraw is a sensible option will not have read that page; so I think it warrants at least brief explicit mention here too. RfA can be a rough process and it doesn't make sense for somebody to run the gauntlet past their ego's tolerance simply because they were unaware they can "Say Uncle". It's also a good place to mention a rare but important technicality that only the candidate, not nominators, can execute a withdrawal. To my knowledge this is not official policy but it seems like it should be (at least to me presently). See the discussion at Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 29#Withdrawing nomination?. I therefore intend to add a brief section about withdrawing one's RfA between the "Expressing opinions" and "Discussion, decision, and closing procedures" sub-sections. Here's is a first draft:

Withdrawing your RfA request
Once the RfA process has started, for any reason the candidate (and only the candidate) can withdraw their RfA request. Withdrawal is useful, for instance, if the candidate has been convinced by the discussion that they are not ready for adminship, which helps save unnecessary further effort by the community. It is also worthwhile when the process is proving to be unpleasant emotionally or if there has simply been a change of heart. Should any of the candidate's second party nominators wish to revoke their nomination, it should be simply stated as part of the RfA discussion: nominators cannot withdraw the request even if they are the sole nominator. In some cases, such as with potential WP:NOTNOW closures, candidates "should always be asked" to withdraw as a courtesy.

To withdraw your RfA, following the instructions given at Misplaced Pages:Guide to requests for adminship#Closure.

Please comment on this proposed new section. One thing I notice from browsing recently NOTNOW-closed RfAs is that users are not being asked to withdraw before having their nomination closed as NOTNOW as Misplaced Pages:Bureaucrats#Permissions says "should always" happen. Having "must do" items in any procedure adds complexity and since the current behavior is in some sense the ways things "naturally happen", I think the best action is to reword the policy to change "should always" to some sort of "suggested that" phrasing. The sentence above dealing with this would then have to be modified to reflect those changes. Also, I think the proposal that only candidates (and not nominators) can withdraw is a sound one based on good common sense; however, if you note a consequences I am missing, please explain them. Jason Quinn (talk) 20:16, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't think I quite understood all of that. Do you consider it acceptable for an RfA to be closed by a non–crat as NOTNOW even if the candidate has yet to withdraw? Mellowed Fillmore (talk) 20:56, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Mellowed Fillmore. If the closure is "uncontroversial", a non-crat can close a request as NOTNOW even if the candidate has not withdrawn. This is stated in the "Discussion, decision, and closing procedures" section ("If uncontroversial, any user in good standing can close a request that has no chance of passing in accordance with WP:SNOW and/or WP:NOTNOW.") If you are aware of conflicting statements elsewhere please post the links. Jason Quinn (talk) 23:26, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

The above sounds like it would make a better essay or addition to WP:RFAADVICE than official instructions. Any instructions on the RFA page should be neutral and straight to the point, i.e. "Candidates many withdraw for any reason". It shouldn't list some of many possibilities candidates may want to withdraw their RFA. I cannot recall an instance of an RFA where if the above information was provided in advance, it would have made a difference. An instruction as elaborate as the one proposed is a beginners guide explanation. If the candidate is already at RFA and needs an explanation about the benefits of withdrawing their nomination, then it's like a case of NOTNOW and they haven't done the prerequisite reading anyway. Mkdw 21:22, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Mkdw. Your advice is worth consideration. I too am concerned about any additions being longer than they need be. Perhaps a few sentences above are expendable. Instruction creep is a Misplaced Pages usability problem in general, so I only want to lengthen this page with justifiable cause. In fact, I recently copy-edited the whole page very carefully to make it more succinct (and simultaneously more accurate). On the other hand, since this is probably where most people start learning about the RfA process, I think it's beneficial if the prose is engaging and not too dry so veering into "instruction only" style could be off-putting. It's a balance. Perhaps tidy Version B is more compatible with your view:

Withdrawing your RfA request
Candidates may withdraw their RfA request for any reason by following the instructions given here.

This version, I think, may be too brief and that you may be overestimating how familiar many first-time candidates are with the RfA process. I would guess that for many, they are learning as they go and they may be unaware option of withdrawal and why it's used even among viable candidates. I note that the current text is not merely "neutral and straight to the point" but does have some "inviting softness" to it. Maybe a compromise is Version C:

Withdrawing your RfA request
Once the RfA process has started, for any reason the candidate (and only the candidate) can withdraw their RfA request. Withdrawal is useful, for instance, if the candidate has been convinced by the discussion that they are not ready for adminship, which helps save unnecessary further effort by the community. In some cases, such as with potential WP:NOTNOW closures, candidates "should always be asked" to withdraw as a courtesy.

To withdraw your RfA, following the instructions given at Misplaced Pages:Guide to requests for adminship#Closure.

Do you feel this is a fair compromise? Cheers, Jason Quinn (talk) 23:26, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

If I might, I'd like to suggest an alternative version ("D", why not) to make it a bit more straightforward and understandable:

Withdrawing your RfA request
The candidate (and only the candidate) may withdraw their RfA at any time and for any reason. Such reasons may include a simple change of heart or loss of desire to complete the process, and the candidate is not required to explain their withdrawal. In some cases, such as with potential WP:NOTNOW closures, candidates "should always be asked" to withdraw as a courtesy.

To withdraw your RfA, follow the instructions given at Misplaced Pages:Guide to requests for adminship#Closure.

(the authors of the previous drafts may want to edit out the shared typo following the instructions given ...) Deadbeef 00:02, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

• I endorse Deadbeef's version unless someone comes up with something better. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 05:07, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
• I think Deadbeef's version is good too, but one question (for Jason Quinn): why is "should always be asked" in quotation marks? Doesn't seem necessary, especially with the link. ansh666 05:52, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

• I agree, please lose the WP:SCAREQUOTES then it will be acceptable. -- Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 07:35, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
• You are right, the scarequotes should not be used. The associated wikilink, by the way, is actually more intended as a reminder to editors who wish to close RfAs, which I think is worthwhile since I noticed candidates are not being asked to withdraw before having their RfA closed in cases where they should be asked. I think Deadbeef's version is good. I'm making two minor adjustments. I'm removing the scarequotes and I'm also removing the problematic word "always" from "should always". This retains the full meaning yet is more flexible to a softening of the policy itself (which I intend to try for at some point). So I present (Version E):

Withdrawing your RfA
The candidate (and only the candidate) may withdraw their RfA at any time and for any reason. Such reasons may include a simple change of heart or loss of desire to complete the process, and the candidate is not required to explain their withdrawal. In some cases, such as with potential WP:NOTNOW closures, candidates should be asked to withdraw as a courtesy.

To withdraw your RfA, follow the instructions given at Misplaced Pages:Guide to requests for adminship#Closure.

It seems safe to say there will be at least semi-consensus among the few of us for this version. We shall wait for a few days or so for further comment. Barring none, I will add the section to the page. Jason Quinn (talk) 12:38, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Looks reasonable to me. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:59, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Same here. Should make a useful addition to the page. G S Palmer (talk • contribs) 17:01, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

ansh666 19:45, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

I support the overall proposal and any of the above options with a mild preference for the last proposed version. Nitpick: could we maybe have the header read "Withdrawing your RfA" or "Withdrawing your request for adminship"? While not quite the same, I'm getting department of redundancy department chills from this one. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 17:08, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

@Martijn Hoekstra: Went ahead and fixed it: I don't foresee the OP opposing the change. G S Palmer (talk • contribs) 17:16, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm fine with this revision; I already removed one request from my version without noticing the header and only kept the quotes for consistency. Deadbeef 22:46, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Great catch, Martijn Hoekstra. I went ahead and struck it from the other versions too. The last remaining edit that might be worthwhile is a change from "Such reasons..." to "This...", which I think reads better. Stuck that. Jason Quinn (talk) 22:58, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Did you mean ... struck that? --Stfg (talk) 00:15, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Yep. I don't know what it is but as I've get older I've noticed weird typos have starting infesting my comments. Things like this or entire dropped words where I "said it in my head" while typing but apparently never typed it. Sometimes my first draft is so borked that wonder how it is what I just wrote. Doesn't help concentration to have a one year old running around either which my play a role. ;-) EDIT: There is another one! Jason Quinn (talk) 08:36, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Two additional notes: "(and only the candidate)" is grammatically redundant when it already specifies "the candidate". I understand it's there for added effect, but I think the value gained by including such a statement, it is not necessary. Secondly, if we're going to clarify that in the instance of NOTNOW cases, withdrawal "should be" asked, then further clarity that SNOW closures are the exception to that instruction. I think it's important to keep this secondary mechanism in place, especially for NOTNOW cases, to preserve the cap on the communities time and to prevent RFA's from getting out of hand in the spirit of BITE. Mkdw 17:06, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Saying "The candidate may withdraw their RfA ..." doesn't imply that nobody else can, so I think the parenthesis isn't really redundant. (I agree with the rest of what you said.) --Stfg (talk) 18:20, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

You're talking about logical fallacy which has no real world applications. Rules should always be written literally and absolute. We created a statement where "X has permission to do Y". That is the one true statement in existence about "withdrawal" and it's very clear. You're proposing that, in general, "A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U V, W, AND/OR Z has permission to do Y" because there's no rule stating that statement to be untrue. The reason this type of logic does not prevail is because there are an infinite number of resolutions that would need to written to exclude the possibility of something other than what was written from happening. You'd have to re-write the entire RFA page and most of the rules and policy pages on Misplaced Pages. For example, let's review the first sentence of the RFA page: "Requests for adminship (RfA) is the process by which the Misplaced Pages community decides who will become administrators". By your same logic, perhaps we should write some clarification such as "the Misplaced Pages community (and only the Misplaced Pages community) decides who will become an administrator". I certainly don't want any politicians, ducks, aliens, rocks, single editors, me or anything else deciding who becomes an administrator (joke). The sentence is meant to be read literally and because it states "the Misplaced Pages community", without referring to anything else, that nothing else is inclusive. Separately, we've never had an issue with someone improperly "withdrawing" another person's RFA. We've had problems with other people improperly deleting, closing, moving them, etc. Mkdw 23:52, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

No, Mkdw. (A) Apples and oranges. The nature of the RfA sentence is clear because of the way it's structured, particularly the definite article in it. Others (e.g. Jimbo, and stewards I imagine) could, if they wished, create sysops, but that's clearly outside the scope of the RFA page. The present case is merely saying that somebody can do something, which is not an exclusive statement. (B) The real fallacy is to suppose that complete avoidance of logical redundancy makes for good, clear communication. And what Jason Quinn said below. Cheers, --Stfg (talk) 11:32, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

• Comment: I'm a little bit opposed to the sentence "n some cases, such as..." as counterintuitive to the NOTNOW instructions. Sometimes a self-nomination is obviously too soon, and while of course we needn't be harsh with a newbie who doesn't understand the process even though they clearly didn't read the giant edit notice, closing the RfA and posting a gentle explanatory note on the user's talk page should be sufficiently courteous. NOTNOW is not a withdrawal, technically, it's a de-nomination or a speedy close. I guess I'm concerned about instruction creep with this. Besides this comment, I fully support the most recent version. Ivanvector (talk) 19:43, 8 January 2015 (UTC)
• Hi, Mkdw and User:Ivanvector. Mkdw, regarding your first point, the phrasing is not redundant because "only the candidate" is not repeating what's come before but narrowing the scope. It is true the wording could be made shorter by merely stating the narrowed scope: "Only the candidate may withdraw their RfA and for any reason". This says the same thing and is shorter but I don't think it works well, especially as an introductory sentence. I pondered several variations of this (and some based on "The candidate alone") but they all seem less satisfactory than the current wording. As for the courtesy withdrawal concerns, the phrasing above pretty closely mirrors that on the wikilinked policy/guideline page. Both your comments highlight the deficiency of policy's implementation (vague and underdeveloped) and, as I mentioned above, the policy itself on mandatory courtesy withdrawal requests is undesirable. In the sake of progress, I would move that we accept the present wording of Version E as more-or-less mirroring current policy. This could be debated too. Does this courtesy request only apply to non-crat closures? The policy is rather ambiguous. The policy only mentions NOTNOW and not SNOW so saying that SNOW does not require a courtesy request, while common sense, is an extrapolation. It is clear the policy needs revision. When the policy is changed, we can change this section to match. It is my first thought that the policy should be changed to say that editors (crat and non-crat) considering closing an RfA as NOTNOW, may consider contacting the candidate to request Withdrawal first. If the policy is changed to say that, it matches how editors are actually closing RfAs in practice and is a gentle nudge to try and be polite. The wording here in this little new section can then be changed to match. Jason Quinn (talk) 22:59, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Reply above but the argument that "only the candidate" is not redundant is on the assumption of logical fallacy. See my reply to Stfg Mkdw 23:52, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi, User:Mkdw. I have read what you wrote above and it would precipitate considerable more discussion. The source of the disagreement is semantic over the meaning of the word "redundant" and the implied domains of discourse in each context). I think it's best not to let the general discussion get side-tracked over this particular sticking point. If you like, we can collaborate to improve the lead sentence in a more specific discussion thread. Even if the wording in that sentence isn't the absolute best possible, I cannot see it being viewed as outright bad. I would suggest we stick with Version E for the moment, noting your objection, and proceed with adoption. Is that reasonable and agreeable to you? Jason Quinn (talk) 11:21, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

• All this discussion sparked off by a single isolated occurence. I don't believe the current policy or guideline needs any changes at all. RfA has got along for years without needing to parse the syntax and semantics of every sentence in the advice or instruction pages. NOTNOWs (and any other RfA for that matter) are so few and far between nowadays, does it really matter? --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 07:48, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

A little over a third of the unsuccessful RfAs in 2014 were closed as NOTNOWs. As short as the official page is, I don't think it hurts it any to add three net sentences about a not-so-uncommon end result. The discussion has developed on the topic, so the question is no longer "is it worth it to talk about?" At this point, a better question is "is leaving the version as is for history's sake better than the suggested revision?" which I think is a "yes, there's no reason not to". Deadbeef 08:03, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Kudpung, "All this discussion" is not sparked by a single isolated occurrence. If you peek at Misplaced Pages:Unsuccessful adminship candidacies (Chronological)/2014, you'll see that withdrawal is one of the most common outcomes of unsuccessful RfAs and wasn't being properly presented to candidates as an option. The purpose of this proposal is to rectify that. The issue of the NOTNOW stuff is just incidental. Jason Quinn (talk) 11:00, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

I was simply trying to point out that RfAs are nowadays so few and far between, that 'a little over a third' of the unsuccessful as NOTNOW and those that were withdrawn by the candidate are insignificant - this is not like the good old days when we had several hundred RfAs per year which would have made 30% a significant figure. I'm sorry, but having voted on almost every RfA in the last 6 years and having seriously analyzed most of them, I prefer to deal with realistic figures and simply quoting percentages means nothing until we say what it is a percentage of. That candidates are not aware of withdrawal as an option I beg to differ. If I recall correctly, most withdrawals take place following friendly prompts on the candidates' talk pages, and only rarely do they boldly insist on seeing it right through to the bitter end. I still think this discussion is a solution looking for a problem and that there are much greater issues surrounding RfA (and adminship) that sadly don't create so much talk. We all know, and have seen it proven time and time again, that most candidates who fail per NOTNOW or WITHDRAWN didn't take a blind bit of notice of the instructions and advice anyway. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:51, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Come to think of it, I'm leaning towards agreeing with Kudpung. Withdrawal is a common sense part of these sort of processes, on wiki and in real life. Things are withdrawn all the time around here. We've given it a formal name, but really the usual way of things is someone can change their mind about a course of action at any time. Really we should only need to have a statement if our policy didn't allow a candidate to withdraw. That said, I'm not so vehemently opposed to briefly mentioning the right of candidates to step down if they so choose. It's not hurting anything. Ivanvector (talk) 15:19, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Kudpung sums it up nicely. It should also be taken into consideration the well known fact that when policies and guidelines grow in length and depth, that their practical among the public surpasses a threshold and has the opposite effect. The most satirized example being Apple's ToS. We already have a massive problem with candidates not reading the required meeting, and the proposal does not solve any current problems. I reiterate that if anything should be included, it should be short and to the point. Listing examples of why withdrawal may be the right option for you and restating a sentence already in place at NOTNOW seems excessive to the point of possibly being detrimental. Mkdw 15:45, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

IPs: This is getting ridiculous

Recent interventions by IPs have been unhelpful to say the least. Is it time to consider prohibiting anonymous edits on any part of a current RfA page?: Noyster (talk), 15:40, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

No. Townlake (talk) 15:46, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

No, IPs are people too and should be able to comment, ask questions, etc. I can't think of any "unhelpful" IP interventions that occured recently anyway. --AmaryllisGardener 15:49, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Nope, Whilst I agree most IPs here are more vandals than anything I've not yet witnessed any stupidity from any IP on RFA pages so don't see much point banning them, and anyway If IPs do cause shit we simply use Twinkle .... –Davey2010 • (talk) 15:55, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Diffs would have been useful here. Based on what I've seen recently, though, IP participation isn't a problem. Lesser Cartographies (talk) 16:34, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm guessing this is what Noyster is referring to. Mellowed Fillmore (talk) 17:38, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

But we see stuff like that from registered users too. --AmaryllisGardener 17:41, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Registration should have its privileges. Notwithstanding the project's history of egalitarian participation by anyone, including IP users, it seems to me that registration is an extremely small burden for the privilege of participating in the selection of the project's sysops. Please note that I am generally not in favor of banning IPs from various topics, but in the context of RfAs I am more inclined to view such a proposal favorably for one simple reason: it will encourage more IPs to register. The second benefit: other RfA participants will be able to understand who is commenting and associate an on-wiki history and reputation with the RfA comments.

As for "unhelpful" RfA comments from IPs, we have witnessed several in the last month, one of which triggered a storm of pile-on opposes and torpedoed a qualified candidate and vandal fighter. In that particular case, the "IP" had no prior edit history and was almost certainly a registered user commenting while logged out. And that does offend my sense of fairness and on-wiki propriety. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:06, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

• My 2 cents There are certain areas where anonymous commentary should not be allowed. This is one of them. -Ad Orientem (talk) 18:28, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

• I'm with Dirtlawyer and Ad Orientem on this one. RfA tends to function as an actual non-anonymous election rather than a WP:STRAWPOLL - more than roughly a seven-tenths majority tends to be an automatic pass, for example, and only in a small range of actual vote count results do we pass discretion to the 'crats. For that reason I'm ok with requiring registration, maybe not to comment but certainly for voting. For the record I don't think there's clear evidence that IPs are more disruptive at RfA than registered users, at least not lately. Ivanvector (talk) 19:44, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

• FWIW, I do believe that IPs are already not allowed to !vote at RfA. Mellowed Fillmore (talk) 19:52, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

IPs can edit and can therefore !vote. We have an editnotice discouraging it, and I assume that any IP that !votes has their edit removed. Since threaded discussion is supposed to be discouraged in active RfAs (and should be on the talk page instead) I'm still okay with a technical restriction from editing RfAs for non-confirmed accounts and IPs. Ivanvector (talk) 22:19, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: No, unregistered users (i.e. IPs) cannot !vote. It's not just in the editnotice, it's explicitly stated at Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship#Expressing opinions, first sentence. --Redrose64 (talk) 23:37, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

That's what I meant to say. It is technically possible (not prevented by software) for IPs to post !votes, but (I'm assuming) either the 'crats disregard the !votes or the !votes are removed. I haven't seen it happen so I don't know. Ivanvector (talk) 23:40, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: When reading through old RfAs, I once saw an IP's vote struck and told something like, "Sorry, IPs can't vote on RfAs", so it has happened. --Biblioworm 23:47, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

In my opinion any IP who magically finds their way to RfA for their first edits is clearly someone logging out of their account to avoid scrutiny. Just like we don't allow votes from accounts created the same day we of course should not allow what is obviously evasion of scrutiny. It is sock puppetry through evasion of scrutiny in a contentious area.

Unlike other debates RfA is essentially vote, let us not pretend it is anything else. Allowing IPs and brand new users is allowing vote stacking.

We need to be stricter about disruption, trolling, and people not using their main accounts to avoid scrutiny.

Misplaced Pages is an encyclopedia anyone can edit, that means we welcome anon users to edit the encyclopedia. Those is not some suicide pact where we have to allow them into every part of our process.

In AfD the closer takes into account the value of each argument as related to article retention policies. In RfA the 'crats have very little discretion. So no, we should not let anonymous people vote. They should have an account and it should be created before the RfA was started.

The only people this will effect are those who know Misplaced Pages enough to have an opinion on RfA but are abusing multiple accounts or logging out to avoid scrutiny. If you think about it then it is obvious. Chillum 20:02, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Oppose If there is a good reason to either oppose or support and RfA, then anyone should be able to voice it. —Gaff 20:09, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Should they get more than one vote? Because if we allow anonymous and new users to vote then there is nothing stopping someone from voting with their account and then logging out and voting again. Same goes with users created after the RfA. Chillum 21:40, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

That's been a risk since the beginning of voting on Misplaced Pages. It hasn't proven to be a meaningful problem. Townlake (talk) 02:54, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

To me, both you User:Chillum and, say, IP 0123456789, are anonyms. --Vejvančický (talk / contribs) 09:52, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

It has not been a problem because we don't let IPs and new accounts vote. By my memory it has been that way since I was made admin in 2006. Chillum 03:01, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Strong oppose We should be able to distinguish between constructive and unconstructive, rather than base our decisions a priori, on the shape of someone's username. --Vejvančický (talk / contribs) 09:52, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Support User:Chillum makes some strong arguments. I certainly believe a !vote should at least be dignified by a registered account. It shows respect to the community. An IP with an edit history of just voting in an RfA is concerning. A voter is a member of the Misplaced Pages community, who has shown some courage in registering, and showing responsibility for their editing career on WP. An IP, by their very reluctance to register, shows an ambivalence to the spirit of the project, and should not be trusted in such a critical community process as an RfA. Sorry if this sounds harsh to IP's of good will reading. So BLOODY REGISTER! Your Misplaced Pages needs you! :) Irondome (talk) 03:48, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• I also want to point out that this in no way goes against our "The encyclopedia anyone can edit" philosophy because admin elections are not part of the encyclopedia. Anyone can edit the encyclopedia but admins are chosen by the actual community. Chillum 03:55, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• IPs aren't allowed to vote, but there's no reason they shouldn't be allowed to offer non-disruptive comment. No one should be allowed to offer disruptive comments, so singling out IPs here makes no sense. (Of course, making a coherent argument for why your friend isn't a good candidate for administration isn't disruptive; it's the whole point). WilyD 12:10, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

• The kind of IP participation at RfA recently and which has sparked off this thread smacks of block or ban evasion, and proxy servers. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 14:13, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
• Strong oppose to a disgraceful proposal To summarize: The original proposer proposes to ban IPs from these discussions. The OP does not list any examples of IP "misconduct", and other editors can only think of one. The "misconduct" is an IP editor demanding evidence that the nominee actually is ignorant of CSD as accused. At the time of this writing, that evidence still has not been provided, so the IP has a good point. Meanwhile, various editors accuse the IP of being a banned editor, even though they could be a long-time IP editor whose IP hopped, or a long-time registered editor who forgot to log in. And wouldn't a block evading editor come here to trash the nominee in retaliation for their role in getting them banned? This one is defending the nominee from criticism. Frankly, I consider the IP conduct at the nomination much better than most of the registered users commenting here. Seriously, this is disgraceful, these claims that this guy is evil because of numbers in their usernames. Major WP:AGF violation. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 15:35, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Oiyarbepsy, that's a very strong comment. While you list a lot of relevant reasons why we may be wrong to disapprove of IP particpation on RfA, I feel you have perhaps not only insufficiently examined those arguments, but that you may be stretching our AGF policy a tad too far. Experienced editors have long since learned to recognise and interpret the patterns often associated with IP editors and they have a right to be skeptical. That said, the en.Wiki still has the most lax rules of all the major Wikipedias; perhaps because the others (e.g. de, fr, sp, it, etc.) having been created later, have seen the loopholes in our systems. There is a lot of call for change in our admin (s)election method - essentially what we need is improvement. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:56, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

If someone has to register just to participate in RfA we will be questioning their motives if they have no other edits under that username. The Moose is loose! 07:41, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Judge the post, not the posted, until you have genuinely good reason to believe otherwise. Genuinely good reasons does not include prejudice and stereotypes. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 15:17, 10 December 2014 (UTC

Oiyarbepsy, just to recap: Experienced editors have long since learned to recognise and interpret the patterns often associated with IP editors and they have a right to be skeptical. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:44, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Kudpung, often doesn't mean always, and not all of us are automatically skeptical of IPs. Yngvadottir (talk) 16:42, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Yng, I know it doesn't - it was me who said it and I felt I had to repeat it. But I never said I was automatically skeptical of IPs. That's what I mean by having the experience to recognise the signs. The skill can be acquired of course, but 3 months and 3,000 edits don't cut it. Depends where you work most on Misplaced Pages, how often you are prepared to spend literally hours untangling intrigues, and how many years you've been doing it. I enjoy that kind of detective work, some don't. Gut feeling and intuition often start with recognising stereotype behaviour. Younger/newer editors tend to be more casual in their approach to such issues whereas old codgers like me are plodders, leaving no stone unturned. That's why we dig up the dirt on RfA - but also give credit when it's due. No wonder we end up sounding cynical ;) Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 17:12, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm touchy on the topic. I have quite a bit more experience now than when I passed RfA, including some dark, dark stuff. I just got done reporting yet another incarnation of a long-term cross-wiki vandal who edits both as IPs and as a registered user. But I'm all too aware that some anti-vandal patrollers - many of them relatively new - are unreasonably biased against unregistered editors. And I hadn't realized how bad that was until relatively recently. Patterns are one thing, but bias is real and hurts us in many ways. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:43, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

• There are plenty of admins who have a trigger finger when it comes to blocking new accounts or IPs. There's a reason we have stages of {{uw-vandal1}}, {{uw-vandal2}}, etc. But, many admins ignore this and block after too few warnings. So much of our content is contributed by new users or IP editors, yet we casually disrespect them and do not give them the courtesy we tell ourselves we're to give them. --Hammersoft (talk) 17:58, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

• Support. Allowing IPs to participate invites trolling and double-voting (even if the second vote is not counted, it may create a discouraging atmosphere). RFA noms should be s-protected from their moment of creation. bd2412 T 18:01, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

• Comments from IPs are easy to moderate (we've tolerated far worse disruption from people with actual accounts, if anyone remembers kmweber or a half dozen other RfA trolls over the years). I don't recall that IPs have ever been allowed to vote. I'm okay with this arrangement. Nathan 18:35, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

• Thanks to all who have presented good arguments on both sides. Unfortunately, some contributors here assumed the discussion was about whether IPs should vote in RfAs, even though - as Redrose points out - the RfA page states only editors with an account may place a numerical (#) "vote". My post was to ask whether IPs should be permitted to comment in the voting section, or pose questions to candidates. This is not because of any belief that IPs are inherently "evil", but purely from seeing the effect of their particular interventions in recent RfAs. OK, IPs can start new accounts, but these are more easily discounted and can't be covered by "forgot to log in" or such excuses. Anyway, belatedly, here are recent examples as called for. Leaving aside plain vandalism and challenging of legitimate #votes:

Weak attack couched as a question.

Attack couched as a question, had an arguable case but quoted a weak example. The very fact that the question was posed by an IP enabled claims that the RfA had been "derail"ed by a "trolling IP" and led to much ill-feeling.

Obscenity and fake signature. Once reverted, they resorted to sockpuppet accounts and the RfA had to be restricted to auto-confirmed users: Noyster (talk), 18:55, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Number 1 was weak critism, yet still constructive to the discussion. Number 2 was very valid criticism (possibly the most important comment in the whole discussion). Number 3 was the only one that was inappropriate. All of these could have been done by registered users. Number maybe could have been an argument against IPs, except for all the sockpuppetry, which an IP ban wouldn't have done anything about. And blaming the IP for a registered editor's bad faith and prejudice? You're joking, right? Oiyarbepsy (talk) 20:15, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Comment I just noticed my technically incorrect references to IPs !voting upthread. However I still hold to my original points. Only registered eds should comment in an RfA. A comment can be as powerful as a vote. Think of the (to my mind) unconstructive contributions of IP 190.245.75.48 that helped screw up Harry's recent nomination, which in addition lost us an excellent ed and potential admin. Again, a process as serious as an RfA should only have participants who wish to be part of, and take responsibility to the community by their actions. At least a registered ed who is disruptive can be slagged off, or even sanctioned. I see no sinister development if this proposal comes to pass. Just another incentive to register. Irondome (talk) 00:39, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

I wasn't "trolling," I was voicing legitimate concerns that many other editors shared. Were they all "trolls?" If I were you, I'd be more careful about my choice of words. Note that neither my question nor my reply to TParis' response to Townlake's oppose was reverted. Anything even remotely reminiscent of trolling would've been reverted, you can take that to the bank. Thomas.W was not a suitable candidate for adminship, and it was necessary to have his deficiencies in the department of interaction with new users accentuated as early as possible in the process which, for political reasons, was only possible for an IP user to do. You've only been around for two years so you don't yet fully understand the more advanced aspects of the RfA process, but believe me: it was for the best. It's regrettable that Thomas decided to quit rather than change his gruff demeanor and try again at a later date, but what can you do. We have plenty enough of incivil administrators who value their own opinion above everything else already; appointing another one would've been a mistake. Disallowing questions/comments from unregistered users would be a mistake too. 190.245.75.48 (talk) 05:49, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

I have struck the term from my post. It was an inappropriate use of a highly provocative term. For that I apologise. However it appeared that you had made up your mind quite comprehensively in terms of the interaction patterns of the candidate. You still appear to adhere to that view. I still disagree as to the suitability of T.W. as an admin. I do not understand your need for using your IP id for "political reasons" in !voting. I think you are adding unnecessary drama by using this comparison. Let's remember what we are here for. To create and maintain a unique piece of work in human co-operation, and at least vaguely enjoy the experience while we are doing it. I also sense a vague animus towards the unfortunates among us who happen to be admins. Only over the Xmas period we saw an admin dysopped for attitudal issues. The justice of that case aside, do you really have such a lack of confidence in the intelligence of the community that T.W would not have been given a dry slap if he got out of line? Did you not take into account the greatly respected colleagues who nominated and supported the application? I just find it puzzling. On me and my experience I have been around for 2 years and 8 months. I know this is but a blink of an eye compared to yourself, who is obviously a wikipedian who I suspect has been with the project from the beginning. However my understanding of the hidden layers of the RfA process and it's complexities may be more sophisticated than you assume. I have dabbled in real-world politics, I learn fast and I am the wrong side of 50. In any event, I am glad that you returned to continue the dialogue. Regards Irondome (talk) 22:51, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm guessing this may in fact be a reply to moi - hard to tell when identities keep changing. Please re-read, I didn't call you a troll but others did, and because you made that possible it weakened your case, which would very soon have been made by others. No more can I see why a politician couldn't operate under their recognised name - you mean they should put on disguise outfits during a campaign?: Noyster (talk), 20:23, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

I wouldn't worry about it Irondome, trolling is the only reason the user would hide behind 190.245.75.48. His proxy has now been blocked, and that is as clear a reason as any why IPs should not be allowed to participate on RfA under any circumstances whatsoever. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 13:21, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Oppose.

1. I remember an occasion when a single purpose account was created for the sole purpose of opposing in an RfA. (I checked two years after the RfA, and the account had made no more edits at all, confirming my impression that it really was a single purpose account.) The editor's reason for opposing was totally out of line with policy, common practice, common sense, and everything else that makes any sense. Several editors patiently tried to explain to this person why their reason was totally off the point, but he or she persisted with WP:IDHT, whether out of stupidity or as deliberate trolling. (I suspect stupidity.) If we ban IP editors from participating, it will simply mean that anyone who would have been a disruptive IP editor at RfA will instead create a disruptive account like the one I have just described. How will that help?
2. In all kinds of situations, including RfAs, it is much easier to detect IP sockpuppetry than it is to detect sockpuppet accounts, because anyone can easily check whether the IPs are all from one ISP, or different ISPs at the same location, whereas only CheckUsers that can do that for accounts. (I say that as an administrator with a significant amount of experience of dealing with sockpuppets of both kinds.) Forcing editors to create accounts to edit (whether at RfA or anywhere else) would therefore be counterproductive in detecting and stopping "double-voting". It is dead easy to create twenty new accounts that don't look as if they have any connection to one another, and takes only few minutes, but it usually takes much more effort and much more time to switch among twenty (or even five) IP addresses which look as if they are unrelated to one another. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 21:35, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

James, that does'nt cover the registered user who is deliberately hiding behind an IP addres, or as in the case of 190.245.75.48 who is a blocked proxy. Remember, the use of the CU tool is extremely tightly controlled, and fishing expeditions are not allowed. IMO, there can only be dishonest reasons for editing RfA from a proxy. And trolling is one of them. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 13:13, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

(1) Actually, Kudpung, I think it does cover the registered user who is deliberately hiding behind an IP address. My point is that anyone who wants to hide anonymously will still be able to do so, by creating a new account to do so, instead of by editing from a new IP address, and that applies every bit as much to someone who has previously edited from an account as to someone who hasn't. (2) As for proxies, if no administrator has identified it as a proxy and blocked it, then it can equally well be used anonymously or via an account, and if it has been identified then it will normally have been blocked for both anon and logged-in editing, so either way banning IP editing would make no difference to an editor's ability to use the proxy. HOWEVER, it does make another difference: anyone with a little knowledge of proxies can try to check whether an anon editor is using an open proxy, but only a CheckUser can do that with an account, so banning IP editing would force abusive editors to use sock accounts the effect of which would be to make it harder to detect their abuse. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 14:33, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

• Support per Chillum. IPs can't vote for ARBCOM via SecurePoll; does that encourage SPAs? I also support the indiscriminate use of CU to chase SOCKs away. If you're too much of a coward to voice your opinion at RfA logged-in then you don't have any business voicing an opinion, at all. Chris Troutman (talk) 00:47, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

  @Chris troutman: It's not possible to create a SPA account for the purpose of voting for ArbCom: SecurePoll is given a list of valid login IDs that is several weeks old - for the most recent ArbCom election, which began on 24 November 2014, the voting criteria include "has registered an account before 28 October 2014" and "has made at least 150 mainspace edits before 1 November 2014". --Redrose64 (talk) 14:17, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

  I know; maybe a bad analogy. I disagree that IPs should be allowed for fear of encouraging socking. Chris Troutman (talk) 14:30, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

• Support for all the reasons given above. IPs can't be admins themselves for obvious reasons; I see no reason they should be allowed to !vote in an RfA. It takes all of 15 seconds to log in or create an account. Softlavender (talk) 00:52, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

  @Softlavender: I think that you're misunderstanding the proposal. It's not about IPs !voting (they are already prohibited, see my post of 23:37, 2 December 2014 above), but about "prohibiting anonymous edits on any part of a current RfA page" - that's not just !votes, but also covers non-!vote comments. --Redrose64 (talk) 14:17, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Counter malfunctioning

The !vote counter seems to have gotten jammed, it is not displaying the current totals. Is that done by Template:RfA tally or some other function? Would appreciate someone taking a look. --MelanieN (talk) 19:39, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

I gave details of bot and owner at User talk:Titodutta#Problem with vote counter. --Redrose64 (talk) 19:56, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

See this message - all bots went down at 18:00 (UTC) today. --Redrose64 (talk) 21:08, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

All bots?! I better get Twinkling if ClueBot's down! --AmaryllisGardener 21:38, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

There has been some vandalism on the RfAs. I reverted a couple of times manually. Also been manually reverting stuff on my watchlist. I'm not seeing Cluebot in action Irondome (talk) 21:44, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Not all bots, User:HBC AIV helperbot is working fine. Chillum 21:49, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

LOL "Shameless boasting"?! I am always deeply ashamed..some time later Irondome (talk) 21:52, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Head for shelter from vandals, ClueBot's down, so it's the WikiApocalypse! --AmaryllisGardener 21:54, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

We're doomed! Irondome (talk) 21:58, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Woe, woe is Misplaced Pages, for the great bots have fallen! Seriously, though, I guess this explains why the vandalism rates are so high. Most of my recent activity has been on Huggle. --Biblioworm 23:00, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

I am noticing an uptick in vandalism on the recent changes page. Of course it may just be missing cluebot. -Ad Orientem (talk) 22:15, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

I updated it manually, I really I hope I didn't break it when the bot resumes (I'm already living in fear of a world without machines to do work for us). Doing it old school. Do we call this BB (before bot) and (anno bot)? Mkdw 23:08, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

You updated User:Cyberpower678/RfX Report, but the counts at the top of the individual RFA pages come from User:Cyberpower678/Tally. --Redrose64 (talk) 23:28, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Just love watching me slave away? :). User:Cyberpower678/Tally needs to be updated in two places above and below the IF enable statement, and User:Cyberpower678/RfX Report can be updated in clear. Mkdw 23:51, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

The tallybot appears to be working! --MelanieN (talk) 23:54, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

@MelanieN: No, it's not - Mkdw fiddled the figures here and here. --Redrose64 (talk) 23:59, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Oops. --MelanieN (talk) 00:05, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Legobot's working too I believe. --AmaryllisGardener 00:09, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Cyberbot I, which normally runs continuously, restarted at 00:00 and seems to be running normally. --Redrose64 (talk) 00:19, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

AnomieBOT is ok. Thank goodness, wouldn't it be horrible if maintenance tags weren't dated for a day or so? *sarcasm* --AmaryllisGardener 01:37, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Not all bots run on labs. My bots are not dependent on labs being up. Wbm1058 (talk) 14:13, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

I think we should set up a redundant lab 2 to handle such cases at least for essential bots like ClueBot NG. --117.198.91.210 (talk) 15:50, 17 January 2015 (UTC)