Hi, I've been here a while, (though my name may seem unfamiliar as I've recently been through wp:CHU). I first considered going for admin in September 2007 because I wanted to edit a protected page, but after realising what a big deal it was I thought I'd hold off a year before applying and see if I still wanted to do it. Since then I've reverted a fair bit of vandalism, using almost every variant that Arnon Chaffin has to offer. I think that the only vandals I've reported who haven't subsequently been blocked are the ones who were being blocked whilst I was reporting them. As well as reverting vandalism and welcoming newbies, I've:
Got through my difficult early period without actually getting blocked for edit warring, (both my current and former home IP addresses seem to have behaved themselves as well).
I think I understand why Gnaa, Nigeria doesn't yet merit a mention on GNAA though it may well do so yet as it probably exists, and I know why the trolls of the same name don't merit a mention.
I've made some hopefully useful edits, including to some quite controversial pages. My watchlist currently includes a comic, a Scientist, a Rock Star, an island, a ring and a couple of rude words that I'm not going to link to from here.
My involvement in getting stuff deleted has been minor butusuallysound, and has been growing since I've started patrolling New Pages.
I've been a Rollbacker for several moons, and I hope you'll agree that I've used that tool responsibly.
Recently I've started hanging out at wp:ani and wp:fac (though at FAC I usually just proofread and make the odd tweak rather than comment).
I appreciate that some Wikipedians regard the current desysopping process as imperfect, but instead of offering some non-standard recall process for myself, I'd suggest that those who are uncomfortable with the system review the whole desysoping process.
I'm olde enough to have run computer programs with punch cards, but believe I'm still as responsible as I was as a teenager, so please don't hold my age against me.
The only situation that I can think of where it might be appropriate to Ignore all rules and use cool down blocks would be the purely hypothetical one where both edit warrers were clearly inebriated and needed protecting from themselves.
Yes this is a self nomination. Not sure whether that's a sign of being more power hungry than those who go through other routes, or if that is a good or bad thing; but if anyone has analysed what happens to self noms as admins and can show that self noms make bad admins then I'll withdraw.
Should consensus override verifiability? Hmmmm if the consensus is "Please please no more examples of Moai in popular culture" then yes that overrides a verified source that some Aquarium has full size fake Moai in its shark tank. Equally if someone found a source that called Sean Connery British rather than Scottish then I'd stick with consensus (or at least look for another source as I did in this incident), but normally yes verification trumps consensus.
This has been a fascinating and interesting few days and I thank you all for your participation. If I succeed I will of course thank you all individually. However I'm conscious that even with two of my first three Opposers having moved to Support, the figures so far indicate that I may not become an admin on this attempt and I'm aware that blanket thankyou messages from unsuccessful candidates are not good form.
Some of you who've opposed me have done so with various permutations of "not yet", if I fail this time and you were just being polite then feel free to send me as frank a private Email as you want, I have a very thick skin and would rather know my failings than have them emerge unexpectedly.
Some of those who oppose me have done so at least in part because of my use of humour in this nomination; if so I'm happy to repeat that my humour is either self deprecatory or targeted at the process of RFA, it is not targeted at others, or at the role of admin and I hope you are reassured by the seriousness with which I have engaged with the subsequent dialogue. Though I'll fess up to this my use of humour in my more than 13,000 edits has been rare and will remain so, and despite all the scrutiny an RFA attracts not one diff has emerged so far to criticise my use of humour elsewhere. ϢereSpielChequers13:24, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Questions for the candidate
Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as an administrator. It is recommended that you answer these optional questions to provide guidance for participants:
1. What administrative work do you intend to take part in?
A:
Non-contentious or consensus based edits to protected pages.
Deleting the sort of attack and non-notable pages that I've been nominating for speedy deletes.
Blocking vandals of the kind that I've been reporting to wp:AIV.
2. What are your best contributions to Wikipedia, and why?
A: I search for easily confused words like Doe snot/Does not that cause errors that spellcheckers don't pick up. Cavalry/Calvary was a good hunting ground, as was Thier/Their, Crowed/(Crowded, Crowned, Crowd), Planed/Planned, Crowed/Crowded and Formally/Formerly. Then I searched for "posses " and found 603 with circa 90% of them errors. Many of these typos had been on Wikipedia for a long time before I fixed them, so in that sense it is probably more useful work than competing with the hugglers to be the first to revert vandalism.
3. Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past or have other users caused you stress? How have you dealt with it and how will you deal with it in the future?
A: Oh loads, but I wouldn't say any were really stressful. Most are on talk pages, mine or the articles I mentioned above. There are two particular ones on the archive of my talk page; one where I decided to walk away from a topic because I don't believe that consensus is possible between my views and those of other editors on that issue, and the other was with user:Otolemur crassicaudatus but I think our paths have subsequently crossed without further rancour.
I'm afraid that this is going to sound like a copout, but I deliberately don't have criteria for this yet. If sysoped and immediately approached for Rollback I would refer the applicant to an admin who did grant rollbacks. I'm sure that after a while I would start granting Rollback, but only after discussing criteria with experienced admins. I have said which areas I feel ready to start taking on admin duties, and would be unlikely to get involved in other areas for some time. ϢereSpielChequers20:56, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've now thought further and would like to expand this answer slightly. I've created my draft Rollback criteria which are:
I would look at the requester's contributions and specifically their reversion of vandalism to check that they understood what vandalism was.
I would review their contribution history and behaviour against my past experience of rogue users to see if I felt I could trust them not to use Rollback for vandalism.
I would review their history and especially their record of blocks or other conflict to see if I could trust them to use Rollback in good faith and not as part of an edit war. This does not mean I would automatically decline Rollback to a vandalfighter who had also been involved in edit wars, but I would expect their assurance that they would only use Rollback against Vandals, and probably pay more attention to their subsequent contributions than otherwise.
If they had a close relationship with another Admin or senior Editor such as being an adoptee then if appropriate I would check with that admin or editor.
If they had previously had Rollback taken away I would want to know why and by who and what had changed that would justify their having a second chance. Needless to say if the admin's involved were still around I would consult them about such a request.
5. You say that you are prepared to delete attack and non-notable pages through the C:CSD process. What actions would you take on encountering the following as an newly created article tagged for speedy deletion under WP:CSD#A7'
"PDO Pdf creator is a simple to use .pdf creation tool that renders all Microsoft documents into Adobe .pdf format. It has been reviewed by several trade magazines and is in use on hundereds of thousands of computers today."
A.Well A7 is wrong because notability has been asserted. However we already have an article PDFCreator that looks somewhat similar to me. So I'm going to assume for the purposes of the question that after I'd checked them out both the creator and the CSD-flagger of the article and are newbies and not the same person, and also that the article name was PDO Pdf creator or very similar; In which case I would make PDO Pdf creator a redirect to PDFCreator, put a note on the creator's page explaining what I'd done, asking them if I'm correct in thinking that this is the same product or a close variant thereof, with an assurance that if I've made a mistake and they are unrelated items I can undo things. Then I would put a thankyou note on the CSD-flagger's talk page explaining what I'd done and and what codes to use in future - hopefully as diplomatically as was done to me. Oh and unless I was really rushed I'd make sure that both got an appropriate {{Welcome}} if they hadn't already had one. ϢereSpielChequers19:07, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
6. An editor reports to you that User:FooCorp is editing its own article (FooCorp). What do you do as an admin and why? VG☎21:18, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
A.Look at User:FooCorp's contributions, and talk page and the edits that have been made to the article FooCorp. This scenario could be anything from spamming by a company to a company trying to remove vandalism about them, the extremes of that are relatively easy, spammers who ignore warnings get blocked. Vandal fighters are vandalfighters, if Foo Corp the Chinese supermarket employs User:FooCorp to remove racist graffiti from FooCorp then the time to discuss COI and single user accounts is after the vandalism has been fixed. Assuming it isn't extreme enough to be that simple, I want to check if WP:COI has been breached, (and also if there are other group companies in their contributions). If not or if there are signs of good faith then I would explain that editors must be individuals not companies, recommend they consider a user name change and that they read wp:coi, and cut their teeth on unrelated matters before editing any articles where they might have a conflict of interest. Lastly if the editor had simply approached me as an admin then I would thank them and tell them about wp:aiv and or WP:UAA as appropriate. ϢereSpielChequers22:17, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
7. Why do you mark so many of your edits minor? Just in your contributions to the project space it seems like over 95% of the edits you have marked as minor do not fall under the standard definition of a 'minor edit' as held by the rest of the Wikipedia-community.
A.
My understanding was that the vast majority of my edits were minor, but I do have minor set as a default which may not be wise. However I've just reread Help:Minor edit and that has two categories reverting vandalism and fixing typos which I believe each account for a lot more than 5% of my mainspace edits. Probably another 5% of my mainspace edits have been disambiguations such as Queen to [[Queen (band)|Queen]], and my understanding was that they counted as a third category - correcting Wiki links. Could you tell me which two of those three you consider should be marked as Major edits? ϢereSpielChequers23:54, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Clarification: By the project space I meant the 'Wikipedia:' namespace (that is what I have always taken it to mean). Edits such as [1][2][3][4] (and many others) should un questionably not be marked as minor edits. - Icewedge (talk)07:27, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
8. In his daily editing, a newbie user edits a prominent page, and his edit is reasonably trivial. It does not violate any policies, and it contains reliable sources. Unbeknownst to them, the edit they just made was against an overwhelming consensus on the talk page. Disgruntled editors then take action and replace the edited text with their own version which was decided with consensus. Their version, however, does not include any sources at all, and is unverifiable. What should be done to resolve the issue effectively, and which editor is doing the right thing according to policy? In a nutshell: Which is more important, verifiability or consensus?
A:This is the question I've seen on a few RFAs and which I tried to preempt with my paragraph above:
"Should consensus override verifiability? Hmmmm if the consensus is "Please please no more examples of Moai in popular culture" then yes that overrides a verified source that some Aquarium has full size fake Moai in its shark tank. Equally if someone found a source that called Sean Connery British rather than Scottish then I'd stick with consensus (or at least look for another source as I did in this incident), but normally yes verification trumps consensus."
However since you've asked the question I'll take the opportunity to expand my answer slightly. In terms of practical actions for me, if the situation fitted into one of the scenarios that I've outlined then I'd try and explain matters to the newbie, if not then I'd ask the consensus editor(s) what they think of the new source and proceed from there. ϢereSpielChequers13:35, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
9. As an administrator, many inexperienced editors will come to you for advice. Some of them will be highly puzzled as to what is going on, or even angry because of something that has happened to them in the course of their time here. It is important to keep a cool head and handle the situation well, and also be knowledgeable in how to resolve the problem; so I ask - can you give us evidence that you have successfully aided annoyed users in the past?
10. Will your current activities continue if you are appointed with the mop and bucket? If not so, which will you drop/be less active in/be more active in/take up?
A:I think my answer to Q1 covers the areas that I would be more active in. As for areas I'd be less active in, well I've partly covered that in q2, in that I've almost completed my search for certain easily confused words. Equally I've taken certain disambiguation projects as far as I can, so I'd need to find another disambiguation that interested me and where I had or could readily obtain the requisite knowledge. So I'm looking for my next challenge - which is I suppose one reason why I'm here now. ϢereSpielChequers14:11, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is an RFA so all questions are welcome, and I will try to answer in the tone and with the detail that they deserve. Questions that I have anticipated and already have a prepared answer for are liable to get answered quicker than ones where I have to think, doublecheck for trip wires or do other research. Though I have taken part in quite a few recent RFAs and read many many more I would not describe any question asked so far as "hobbyhorse", (q1-3 are of course boilerplate). As several obvious and relevant questions have not yet been asked, the total (including unnumbered ones that are implicit in oppose and support statements) may well reach 42. Which is a very long way of saying "I bow down before the wisdom of the Keeper" ϢereSpielChequers10:51, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Applicant is marking large and substantive talk page edits as minor when this is clearly inappropriate, e.g. [5] (you can easily find more on the same talk page, but this isn't an RfC on the applicant). VG☎20:56, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Vasil, I have now trawled through my talk page and archive and am fairly sure that no-one had previously pointed this error out to me. As mentioned elsewhere I have now changed my default setting, reread the policy and while this is one policy I would support some changes to, I am now editing in accordance with policy. My thanks for bringing this to my attention. ϢereSpielChequers11:20, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it would be fair to make a vote either way, but I think this nomination doesn't sound very professional or intriguing. If this doesn't pass, I suggest the candidate returns in a month or two either with a nominator, or a better written self-nom. Regards. -- how do you turn this on00:31, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've been to XFD a few times, and may well spend more time there in future; But on almost every occasion I've been there so far I've tweaked the article, rather than entered the debate as I think it's unfair on the author of a candidate for deletion to leave obvious typos in it when they are irrelevant to the discussion. However as well as lacking XFD experience I'm probably too much of an Inclusionist to admin on XFD for the foreseeable future, hence it is not one of the things I'm currently offering to help admin in. ϢereSpellCheckers11:12, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No opinion on the candidate's suitability, but interesting nomination statement. And people who complain about "lack of seriousness" should loosen up a bit. I believe that the spirit of wikipedia is that we keep it slightly informal and allow people to be creative, instead of being all bureaucratic and uptight about it. - TwoOars05:48, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support. A bit thin on the resume, but nothing to suggest that this user will abuse/misuse the tools. Most of the rationales in the opposition I find rather unconvincing. Shereth20:12, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Support - probably would be fine, the answer to Q1 is convincing, and there is plenty of experience. 'Weak' because of excessive use of memes, however I'm possibly just being grumpy. PhilKnight (talk) 22:28, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support per Shereth. Unique contributions per Q2, by the way. (I do not see the user's sense of humour--which is evident even in his user name--as a reason to oppose. Rather, I think it lends some warmth and joviality to the project.) Cosmic Latte (talk) 06:25, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Support - Weak because of a conspicuous lack of article contributions beyond reversions, however, I'm supporting because I do believe that you will perform adequately in the areas you've specified. Wisdom89(T / C)08:07, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support - I don't oppose, at this time, as I do sincerely think this editor would be a great admin in the appropriate areas, however due to heavy contributions to the mainspace I give weak support. Would not misuse given permissions and would do well in WP:CSD and vandalism reversion. Keep it up. - PoinDexta1 | Talk to Me | 09:00, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support The lack of article building does not make me believe that the candidate would abuse the tools in any way nor, as per areas of interest indicated in the nomination speech and Q1, that they would get involved in an area in which they are not well versed, such as content disputes. Furthermore, I find that the nomination speech has a mature tone underneath the light-hearted humour and I believe that the project would benefit with the candidate's access to the buttons. Good luck. SWik78 (talk • contribs) 14:13, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Long time user, positive contribs in gnomish and article building behind the scenes, and an absolutely brilliant self-nom. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Don't let the killjoys scare you off, humor is welcome and appreciated, and RFA needs the freshening up. Brilliant nomination. Keeperǀ7616:26, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support I noticed you managing to unconfuse an article I couldn't make head or tail of on my watchlist recently. Well done. You're a decent guy, and I don't think you'd mess up. Tombomp (talk/contribs) 18:46, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Just saw this comment in the oppose section : As for defending my work, well actually I've consciously tried not to, if that's not assuming good faith and not being abusive, I don't know what is. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:07, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Good answers to questions. I would be very careful about your first answer to Q1. Most fully protected pages in articlespace should probably not be edited at all. But the rest of the answers show intelligence and reflection. PLZ NO MOAR CAT PIC KTHX? Protonk (talk) 19:11, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Advice noted and accepted on both points, especially the second. I did make some edits to Sara Palin before it went fully protected, and having just taken my first peek in weeks at both her article and Barack Obama's I can see they both still have tweaks I put there a month or so back (though I now have to page down to see hers), and one reason that I quoted certain pages from my watch list is that they are very contentious semi protected pages where I have made some talk page consensus based edits. ϢereSpielChequers20:09, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Having a sense of humour and posting a cat picture does not necessarily mean he considers adminship a joke. From what I've seen of his wikispace contribution, the spiel chequer does his/her research and that is serious enough for me. Morbidthoughts (talk) 21:48, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support, overall, I like the attitude, I like the question answers, I like the myriad of small-but-smart contributions. And as a bonus, I like cats. I have no concerns. ~ mazcat | c22:24, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support per Morbidthoughts and Mazca. Lighten up a little, friends. I see no reason not to support WereSpielChequers. Hardworking, fine answers, and a sense of humor as well. SIS01:18, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Answers are not perfect. However Chequers' WikiGnome contributions are remarkable. He knows where to find policies and act sensibly. Axl¤[Talk]08:31, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support I support lolcats in RFAs. Opposes are in large part more of a joke than the way the user seems to be taking the RFA, which is to say not much at all. Find something legitimate to oppose about. ⇒SWATJesterSon of the Defender13:56, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Like, for example, a dubious understanding of WP:CSD#A7 and a conviction that creating a redirect then going off and asking another editor if it's correct (thus ingoring WP:OR)? Just a thought Sawtjester but maybe you mind find a reason to support other than "because people are opposing" which seems to be you attitude. I don't oppose lightly and your concept that the opposition is "in large part...a joke" is insulting. Suggest you redact. Pedro : Chat 17:21, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Suggest away. It's not happening. How many of the opposes are actually legitimate reasons based on meritorious arguments, rather than "He's taking it like a joke". I notice you're not condemning their !votes as being insulting to the person standing for RFA? Oh, and the "in large part" was meant to exclude the people opposing for legitimate reasons. ⇒SWATJesterSon of the Defender17:58, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In answer to your rhetorical question (How many of the opposers...) - mine. But since your support seems based on the opposers arguments being a joke, and my oppose is based on hard evidence as demonstrated by questioning and responses I'm sure the rest of the community can decide whose opinion here is better backed up through fact and unbiased consideration. Appologies to the candidate for this discussion which no longer seems germane to their request for the tools. Pedro : Chat 20:43, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Pedro, Coffee and anyone else whose concerns about my candidacy are evidence based. Can I ask if one you would care to check any of the three parts of my answer to question 1? Unless I've missed it, no one has looked at the edits to semi protected pages that I referred to in my nom and come up with examples that show I'm not yet ready to move on to "Non-contentious or consensus based edits to protected pages". Nor has anyone challenged the statement "Deleting the sort of attack and non-notable pages that I've been nominating for speedy deletes" with an example of me nominating something inappropriately - though I'll fess up to one prod decline a couple of months ago, User talk:WereSpielChequers/Archive 1#Jim Stanton after which I had the good sense to check out the user who had just cut the article by 90%, and didn't go to AFD and try to dispose of the remaining 10%. Thirdly re "Blocking vandals of the kind that I've been reporting to wp:AIV." how many of the AIV reports that I've made are worth bringing here with a suggestion as to how they should have been done differently? ϢereSpellCheckers16:37, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If I'm reading this correctly (and I may not be) I think you're basically saying - "look I'm competent in the areas I want to work in". Assuming that's what your message is, fair enough, yes, I mostly agree. The issue from me is that the toolset comes as one package. Moreover I've concerns (per Q5) of your general experience before asking for more tools. I'm sorry, I respect your intentions, but I hope you understand that there are times when a bit more experience will result in a much more "prepared" administrator as opposed to one who may make errors that could cause more problems than the benefit they bring. I'm not saying "never" - I'd never say that. I'm just saying not at the moment. Best wishes. Pedro : Chat 18:48, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
support People don't like the formatting and presentation of the nomination? Lighten up. This isn't a special ritual formula where if you don't say it correctly the evil demons will burst out and devour the planet when you try to first use the admin tools. Look at the candidates contributions. JoshuaZ (talk) 22:47, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
STRONG SUPPORT - I looked over the candidate, as I always do. Then I read over the votes, as I always do. Only, I only made it through a handful of opposes before I decided that was a waste of time and decided he clearly deserved my support. Wow. This process gets more jacked by the day. An admin with a sense of humor? *GASP*... DO NOT WANT *facepalm* The WP:NBD is outdated and an epic ridiculous reason to oppose. There's a fundamental difference in opinion by many people on the big deal status of adminship. Anyone who clearly understands what adminship is the the potential damage a careless admin can cause at this stage in the project knows that adminship is, in fact, a big deal. That and the fact that you're basically elected for life. Backlogs need help, candidate has been on the project for a great deal of time. Has gained experience, as he pointing out in his nom statement before the dreaded cat pic (O NOES), and we can't expect every admin to start out knowing it all on day one. Do his contribs give the indication that he may abuse the tools? No. Is it reasonable to AGF on this one that he can be trusted? Yes. Do we need anymore stuffy, unfunny admins bringing down the morale of this place? Hell no. Clearly this project is losing its sense of humor. That's tragic. Jennavecia (Talk)13:10, 29 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support - not sure what was wrong with the answer to Pedro's second question; while it's true that software isn't A7-eligible, I think the candidate's response to the scenario was actually better than it would have been if he's just removed the tag, as correct as that would have been. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 12:48, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Provisional Oppose at this stage as (aside from a couple of stubs) I can see no content-creation/editing in your history other than uncontentious cleanup. While I don't subscribe to the "must have 10 FAs" school at RFA (I've never once worked on one), I don't think editors who haven't had the experience of putting large amounts of work into an article, and/or defending their work against well-intentioned but wrong "improvements" or especially AFD, are in a position to empathise with quite why editors get so angry when their work's deleted and/or The Wrong Version gets protected, and I don't support users who don't add content to the mainspace being given powers to overrule those who do. If you have got some article experience which I've missed (it doesn't have to be GA/FA, just something to show you understand the people the admins are here to serve) I'll happily change my mind. – iridescent19:32, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ah yes, well spotted. Not particularly recent and having reread them I think I need to go back and make many changes, but I have added thisand that, a few paragraphs in total to Easter Island and related articles. As for defending my work, well actually I've consciously tried not to, and left the Easter Island pages off my watch list for some months. ϢereSpielChequers20:01, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Striking oppose as that seems reasonable (one of the problems with bulk-minor-edits is they "hide" the significant edits in your history) – iridescent14:37, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Per both above. I feel like you are not taking this serious, in a certain way. The picture of the cat really shouldn't be there. Also, you said "but after realizing what a big deal it was" - I'd like to remind you that adminship is no big deal. You nomination also suggests that you may at one point use a cool down block, which is not acceptable.iMatthew (talk) 20:02, 26 September 2008 (UTC) Switched to Support. iMatthew (talk)22:51, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. Humor is a good thing here, especially with all of the personal attacks that happen every day...who cares if he wants to joke about it a bit? I'm sure that he is taking it seriously, and he simply wants to make people laugh a bit when they come here. I did. He will not abuse the mop and will help Wikipedia. That's why I support him, and you guys should be too. Cheers, —the_ed17— 19:41, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - I'm leaving my normal criteria behind on this one, even though you have a lot of contributions that's not always what matters. You don't seem to be taking this seriously for one thing, and you don't seem to grasp what being an admin is; the cat, the joking nature of your self-nom, all give me a bad impression of what you think you'll be doing as an admin is. There are quite a few things in your self-nom I don't like, but I'll just mention one: the fact that you seem to think that verifiability trumps consensus most of the time, that actually depends on who the consensus is, and what the consensus is; our policies are made from consensus so any consensus that leaves policy is more or less new policy, or as it can be used WP:IAR. I might change my mind depending on what other people have to say here, but right now I don't think you are ready. --Coffee // have a cup // ark // 21:13, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ironically, you don't seem to be taking adminship seriously despite stating "...but after realising what a big deal [adminship] was...". Incidentally, I consider that a wrong POV. Please see WP:NBD. —Cyclonenim (talk · contribs · email) 21:33, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry if that wasn't clear, but it was wp:rfa that I was referring to as a big deal, not being an admin. I'm familiar with wp:NBD and I'm here as per q1, I'm asking for the tools because I could make use of some of them. ϢereSpielChequers08:45, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh come off it, it's not like he wants to run for office, he's not taking it as a joke at all, the application it's self is very well presented, the cat is light hearted. It's not as if he's slapped you in the face, you are being pedantic. Metty (talk) 00:52, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Very well presented"? The nomination statement is very difficult to follow due to the lack of bullets for the list of accomplishments, incomplete sentences, incorrect capitalization, and subtle jokes making it difficult to tell when he is being serious and when he is joking. ("I'm still as responsible as I was as a teenager" - does that mean that we shouldn't trust you to accept the potential legal consequences of your actions?) Honestly, the internet has destroyed everyone's spelling and grammar skills and it has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with my oppose !vote above, but I would not at all call his statement "very well presented". --B (talk) 01:39, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Re your query about my age comment, no I am not trying to avoid the legal consequences of my actions. Long ago I was a very responsible teenager, and I like to feel that age has not jaded me and I still have the principles and integrity that I had in my youth. If the age profile here is similar to my experience at Wikipedia:Meetup/London 13 then a large majority of you will be much younger than me, and if so I ask you not to hold that against me. ϢereSpielChequers18:33, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per incredibly sloppy and unprofessional nom statement, 161 Wikipedia space edits and an astoundingly low (124) main talk edits, given his mainspace edits, which, for some reason, are all minor, even though they are not. Erik the Red 2 ~~~~02:55, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The vast majority of my mainspace edits are minor; reverting vandalism, correcting typos and correcting links. However three editors have made this point, and I've changed settings to default to not checking the minor edit box. Also having reread Help:Minor edit I'll concede that some of my edits such as this do add content and therefore should not count as minor. Thanks to all three of you for bringing this to my attention. ϢereSpielChequers06:38, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - Problems all over the board, to be honest. It would seem that the candidate has inadequate experience, and whilst they may not be taking this RfA 'as a joke', I do believe that they are not taking it seriously enough. Adminship is no big deal, but it is a bigger deal than it is being made out to be. Asenine 13:08, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I hate to do this, but I must oppose. I do really love humour, as most people around RFA are quite stuffy. However, your only real mainspace editing (not including minor edits) are stubs. This could be forgiven if you participated in places that help people with article (AFD, FAC, FAR, etc.), but I do not see much (forgive me, I didn't search too long). Again, really sorry about this, but I do not think you can be an admin just yet. Your friend EddyO.D.Wiki[citation needed]13:44, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
So you didn't really look closely at his contribs, and you don't think he'd abuse the tools, and you don't actually want to oppose, but you're going to anyway? Well, whatever floats your boat there Eddy. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:12, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose. Terrible answer to my second question (the answer I was looking for was "Software does not fall under A7"). I'd have forgiven that but your apparent overlooking of some questions to answer others (as well as you nom) seems to indicate that you need to work on your communication skills. Mostly however your slightly bizarre idea that you'd create a re-direct from one article to another on the basis of the name being vaguely the same seems to indicate more general Wikipedia knowledge/experience is required at the moment. Weak, beacuse the nomination does embrace the spirit that becoming an admin is no big deal. Oppose because doing admin things is very much a big deal.Pedro : Chat 20:26, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, low level of Wikipedia-namespace edit indicates a likely lack of policy knowledge. Also, adminship is not a trophy; if anything, it's more responsibility with no reward. Stifle (talk) 22:28, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Per Erik the Red 2. The sloppiness and unprofessional nom makes me feel his adminship will be sloppy as well. Also, his best contributions are fixing spelling errors. As his response to oppose number six says, he states The vast majority of my mainspace edits are minor; reverting vandalism, correcting typos and correcting link. I fail to see large contributions on his part to Wikipedia. DiverseMentality(Discuss it)20:12, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak oppose I too found the attitude in the nominating statement to be fairly problematic; plus a very low level of Wikipedia/Wikipedia talk participation (170 edits in about 1.5 years of having a registered WP account). Nsk92 (talk) 21:05, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, could you give an indication as to what level you were looking for? While I haven't analysed them over time I suspect my 54 reports to AIV could well have started over a year ago, but the other ones such as at RFA and ANI are likely to be mostly quite recent, so while those 170 edits are not much more than 1% of my total the proportion from say the last 4 months is probably somewhat higher. ϢereSpielChequers23:35, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Oppose I have to agree with much of the above - tone of the self-nomination (although I appreciate and expect humour more than most); the use of the "minor edits" for so long, which showed either a callous disregard for policy or a complete failure to understand "minor"; overall lack of experience ... which could be the precursor to my first two points. BMW(drive)12:47, 29 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose; For me, the tone of your self-nom played in your favor, but I'm affraid your lack of policy understanding (almost certainly cause by simple lack of experience) is fatal. — Coren(talk)12:28, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose, at least for now. I'm actually very much a fan of the style of this self-nomination; that's definitely a big point in your favor. Unfortunately, the answer to Pedro's question, as he noted, was off, and there seems to be a lack of participation in other key areas. Apologies, I think you've got the right temperament and the tenure, but there are still some weak points, as Coren noted. GlassCobra10:27, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - lolcats are generally wild cards (and it this case, it did not exactly fair you well). I think this candidate has the proper sense of humor to handle the drama, but the inability to put together a clear explanation of why this candidate should receive the mop bugs me a little bit. As an administrator, there will be frequent times where proper explanation and articulation is necessary to portray why policy is enforced, why certain articles are changed, why users are blocked, etc. If WereSpielChequers wishes to run for adminship again in a couple of months with solid contributions, grab a nomination or just try again with a well-written self-nom, I'll consider supporting, but not now. Sorry. - Jameson L. Taitalk ♦ contribs23:20, 2 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral Interesting... which is only good in an admin if they are doing the right things in an amusing manner. I think that once this mindset has been directed at a few articles and some of the more mundane chores then it will likely to be of benefit in a future RfA. LessHeard vanU (talk) 20:14, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral - Provisional only. I am not sure; you seem like one of those candidates that wanders aimlessly into RfA expecting to get through by accepting every point thrown at you. I would have to see some strong evidence of admin-related activites with good community interaction and an excellent track in most aspects of what is needed in an admin. That cat is off-putting at the moment, not because of what it is, but rather what it represents. Caulde20:45, 26 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral for now – looking at the two edits that you cite above as examples of your work, this edit is missing a few punctuation marks (not a big deal except that you cite your attention to detail as a strength), and this edit contains a couple sentences that seem to have an unencyclopædic tone, and maybe one or two sentences that seem as though they might be a little bit non-neutral. Bwrs (talk) 00:59, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually as I said in Q2 it is my ability to spot typos that I consider my main strength, though I think my punctuation has improved through my involvement here. As for the examples from September last year, well as I said when I cited those two "having reread them I think I need to go back and make many changes". I'm hoping that none of my article edits from the last few months will be found to be non-neutral or having the wrong tone, but the week is yet young.... ϢereSpielChequers06:06, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Matty, We are a third of the way through this RFA, and I hope that your concern about my use of humour in my RFA self nom is at least partially allayed by three things. Firstly despite all the scrutiny that I have been under during this RFA, no one has yet suggested that I have used humour inappropriately in any of the more than 13,000 edits I had made before this RFA began. Secondly my humour here has been either self deprecatory or targeted at the RFA process, I do not use humour to attack others. Thirdly and most importantly I hope you'll agree that my answers to various questions and concerns show that I take the role of admin seriously. PS Answers may be slightly delayed in the next 36 hours as have to go on a little trip, though I hope to be able to log in a couple of times from this my alternative account. However I will be logged on for a large majority of the last 48 hours of this RFA. ϢereSpellCheckers16:35, 29 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh my gosh, are you serious? Are you saying that he has to go to AfD the deletion pages so that he will get opposed in his next RfA for gaming the system and trying to "level up"? *Sigh* not many people are going to know everything when they become an admin. I'm sure that many of them don't! Give them a chance to learn on the job. Cheers, —the_ed17— 02:34, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I changed my comment, and how is it not a place for OJT? Are you saying that potential candidates for adminship should familiarize themselves with everything administrators do? (No, I'm not mad, by the way, no matter how those questions sound.) —the_ed17— 18:57, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
From what I've seen with its combination of policies that one can read up and precursor behaviours on which one can be judged, adminship is a great example of on the job training (remove a few of the optional questions and it would be a near perfect example of OJT). I believe it would be a good idea to reduce the OJT element in becoming and remaining an admin, which is why as I mentioned in my nom I did the questions. But as none of the participants in this RFA have mentioned any of my responses there I think it is safe to assume that any attempt to move RFA away from OJT is going to be an uphill struggle. Also as I said in my nom I started looking at the RFA process a year ago. To expand on that slightly, I've been following at least some of the threads about admins who've got themselves desysopped. The pattern as I perceive it is that failures of judgement and or probity lead to admins being desysopped, and that it happens far far too often. WP:RFA needs to focus on gently redirecting the ambitions of good editors who might make the sort of mistakes that lead to desysopping, reducing the OJT component could be one way to do that. There are others but I'm getting far enough off topic and will keep that for another forum. ϢereSpielChequers12:14, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral--I can't even articulate a good reason for why I'm on the fence about this candidate. It's entirely a gut-level reaction; something about tone, I guess. And yet I'm a lolcat partisan, and yet I have a sense of humor...I really, really, really wish I could say what it is about this RfA that sets off my Gladys-sense; suffice to say there's SOMETHING. I can't oppose with no good reason, but my conscience just won't let me give an unqualified support at this time. WSPCH, I truly don't mean to be cruel or personally-insulting; there's just something about this request--and it's NOT the lolcat!--that doesn't quite sit right with me. When you run again, I'll surely consider you again. It's just...I can't go either way right here, right at this moment, under these circumstances. I think that's got more to do with me than with you, honestly...sorry, friend. Gladys J Cortez23:55, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above adminship discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
