Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls

[Ansh666]

So, I just got a ping from SilkTork (T-C-L), who is apparently going through and offering to nominate the entirety of Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls (T-H-L) (with conditions, of course). This list is, as it says at the top, populated by a userbox (and I've completely forgotten when I put that up and why, so don't ask) - so there are plenty of people who shouldn't even be discussed (me included) getting a ping. The full copy-and-paste message is this. What do you guys think?

Also, sorry if the thread is in the wrong place...

[Zoloft]

So, I just got a ping from SilkTork (T-C-L), who is apparently going through and offering to nominate the entirety of Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls (T-H-L) (with conditions, of course). This list is, as it says at the top, populated by a userbox (and I've completely forgotten when I put that up and why, so don't ask) - so there are plenty of people who shouldn't even be discussed (me included) getting a ping. The full copy-and-paste message is this. What do you guys think?

Also, sorry if the thread is in the wrong place...

The thread is in the correct topic. Thanks for posting this!

[Zoloft]

==Potential admin==

Hi, I notice you're on Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls (T-H-L). Wikipedia would benefit from more admins. If you have been editing for more than 12 months (preferably 24+ months), and have been editing fairly consistently for the past 6 months (preferably 12+ months) with at least 100 edits a month ([https://tools.wmflabs.org/xtools-ec/ this tool] will help) - or an explanation for any gaps, and haven't been blocked in the past three years - or a good explanation for a recent block, don't have a recent history of edit warring or arguing with other editors, feel you can explain why you wish to be an admin, can demonstrate some understanding of Wikipedia's procedures and processes, or know where to go for guidance, and are confident enough to go through a RfA, please get in touch with me. We can talk about it some more, and if all looks OK, I'll nominate you. User:SilkTork 6:58 pm, Today (UTC−7)

[MMAR]

They really have no idea what they're doing, do they?

Of all the places I would go looking for suitable admin candidates, of all the potential methods of identifying them, I think mass mailing a list of people who have simply placed a userbox on their page saying 'I want to be an admin' would be at the very bottom of the pile. By all means, use the list to help you identify prospects, sure, but mass mailing? Honestly, what a joke. I know they're absolutely desperate for more good admins to offset the shitpile they have already and for some reason cannot get rid of by hook or by crook, but come on.

It took me all of 5 seconds to spot at least one person on there who has zero chance, none at all (but worryingly, I have no doubt their actual desire to be an admin one day is out of some misguided belief they're already a decent editor and it's just a matter of time). At best, this risks getting the hopes up of obviously unsuitable candidates, who are simply going to have to be told by SilkTorq that no, they're not ready. Others, like the one I saw, shall be needing to be told some harsh truths. Is he up for that? It's not like the people who are on that list who have a reasonable chance aren't already aware there's an admin shortage or what RfA entails/expects....

You really would think that Wikipedia arbitrators would have more insight and judgement.....but based on their record in cases, maybe not.

[Malleus]

==Potential admin==

Hi, I notice you're on Wikipedia:List of administrator hopefuls (T-H-L). Wikipedia would benefit from more admins. If you have been editing for more than 12 months (preferably 24+ months), and have been editing fairly consistently for the past 6 months (preferably 12+ months) with at least 100 edits a month ([https://tools.wmflabs.org/xtools-ec/ this tool] will help) - or an explanation for any gaps, and haven't been blocked in the past three years - or a good explanation for a recent block, don't have a recent history of edit warring or arguing with other editors, feel you can explain why you wish to be an admin, can demonstrate some understanding of Wikipedia's procedures and processes, or know where to go for guidance, and are confident enough to go through a RfA, please get in touch with me. We can talk about it some more, and if all looks OK, I'll nominate you. User:SilkTork 6:58 pm, Today (UTC−7)

"Not blocked in the past three years"? Blimey, that's setting a pretty high bar!

[Triptych]

Silktork Steve Pereira of Rochester Kent UK is a true twit behaving pathetically to shore up the entire pathetic administrative culture he represents. Now he does spam. I recall his incredibly inept handling of the Tea Party arbitration which concluded with him throwing up his hands and saying "topic ban all the regulars, and me too." Another dirtbag abusive arbitrator, perhaps not quite as overt as some of them.

[JCM]

In theory, this might not be that bad an idea necessarily, if it becomes something like an admin coaching or sort of "admin internship" type of thing, which could I guess be potentially very useful. I have noted that SilkTork has started a few discussion pages about potential candidates, and I am going to assume that will weed out some of the weakest candidates. I'm going to assume he knows that starting about 100 new RfA's at roughly the same time, or anything like that, could easily be perceived as being disruptive and could lead to a lot of spam !voters voting against all the candidates, which I don't imagine is the outcome he's looking for. And, unfortunately, I see some trouble "drafting" people into adminship who have no real interest in the duties, so we more or less are limited to those who would maybe "hope" to be admins some day.

There is an apparently real admin shortage, and so I guess anything which might get a few good new admins involved might not be a bad thing, if it also didn't get a few new bad admins in the picture as well. Maybe the best thing to do in this case is to see what happens after the initial contact, and see how he intends to proceed here.

[Zironic]

I think that nominating users for admin who have no existing ties to the current cackle of admins can only be a good thing.

[Ansh666]

I do seem to recall that this type of thing had been discussed in the past, maybe about a year ago, on-wiki (RfA talk maybe?) along with another page that ranked candidates using some arbitrary scoring system, and was shot down by people who ridiculed the idea for basically the same things that MMAR said. I couldn't find any discussion about this anywhere, so I'm assuming that SilkTork is doing this on his own. His...hub, I guess, for this little project is at User:SilkTork/Chicha (T-H-L). It also seems that he made literally zero effort to see if a candidate is actually reasonably suitable first, as seen on his talkpage - one of the users actually doesn't even know what RfA is even though they have the userbox on their page, and another has, after responding to the RfA message, exactly 10 edits to his name...I guess the screening process that he's created would help weed out the candidates who obviously wouldn't pass, though.

I think that nominating users for admin who have no existing ties to the current cackle of admins can only be a good thing.

And as for this, I'm willing to bet (not much, but still) that the only candidates that come out of this will.

[Zironic]

His...hub, I guess, for this little project is at User:SilkTork/Chicha (T-H-L). It also seems that he made literally zero effort to see if a candidate is actually reasonably suitable first, as seen on his talkpage - one of the users actually doesn't even know what RfA is even though they have the userbox on their page, and another has, after responding to the RfA message, exactly 10 edits to his name...I guess the screening process that he's created would help weed out the candidates who obviously wouldn't pass, though.

I think his process makes a lot of sense. Whenever you do any sort of filtering you always want to filter in the order of Least Effort->Most Effort. In his case I imagine it looks something like this.

Step 1) Template their page to see if they're actually interested.
Step 2) Perform rudimentary edit analysis to see if they full-fill the basic criteria (editing for more than 12 months (preferably 24+ months), and have been editing fairly consistently for the past 6 months (preferably 12+ months) with at least 100 edits a month)
Step 3) Look through their edits to determine if they're a douchebag (Involved in edit wars etc)
Step 4) Talk with them about what's necessary to pass RFA as can be seen here.

[Ansh666]

His...hub, I guess, for this little project is at User:SilkTork/Chicha (T-H-L). It also seems that he made literally zero effort to see if a candidate is actually reasonably suitable first, as seen on his talkpage - one of the users actually doesn't even know what RfA is even though they have the userbox on their page, and another has, after responding to the RfA message, exactly 10 edits to his name...I guess the screening process that he's created would help weed out the candidates who obviously wouldn't pass, though.

I think his process makes a lot of sense. Whenever you do any sort of filtering you always want to filter in the order of Least Effort->Most Effort. In his case I imagine it looks something like this.

Step 1) Template their page to see if they're actually interested.
Step 2) Perform rudimentary edit analysis to see if they full-fill the basic criteria (editing for more than 12 months (preferably 24+ months), and have been editing fairly consistently for the past 6 months (preferably 12+ months) with at least 100 edits a month)
Step 3) Look through their edits to determine if they're a douchebag (Involved in edit wars etc)
Step 4) Talk with them about what's necessary to pass RFA as can be seen here.

My...complaint, I guess...is not the method (which seems reasonable), but the list itself - how it's populated and who it's populated with - and how reasonable people ought to check the list a bit first before deciding that it's good to use.

[DuhHello]

The posting of the messages is extremely sloppy: even retired users are getting it.

[eagle]

The posting of the messages is extremely sloppy: even retired users are getting it.

The linked user Cncmaster (T-C-L) is a very interesting example. He has edited WP for four years and states, "I have considered an RfA, but I know that with no article authorship or significant content contributions, I have a snowball's chance in hell of passing." More bluntly, he describes himself as "a shit-tier content contributor". He commented in the RfA for Ceradon, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =677113235 and wrote an essay User:Cncmaster/RfA Criteria/Content Creation (T-H-L). He was a rollbacker, reviewer, and new page patroller. Having realized that his chances of becoming an admin were hopeless, he retired from WP this summer. If I had to guess, he is a college-aged student.

[MMAR]

The posting of the messages is extremely sloppy: even retired users are getting it.

The linked user Cncmaster (T-C-L) is a very interesting example. He has edited WP for four years and states, "I have considered an RfA, but I know that with no article authorship or significant content contributions, I have a snowball's chance in hell of passing." More bluntly, he describes himself as "a shit-tier content contributor". He commented in the RfA for Ceradon, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =677113235 and wrote an essay User:Cncmaster/RfA Criteria/Content Creation (T-H-L). He was a rollbacker, reviewer, and new page patroller. Having realized that his chances of becoming an admin were hopeless, he retired from WP this summer. If I had to guess, he is a college-aged student.

That's a very good essay, although I withhold full praise as he hasn't seemingly recognised that the whole point of CIVIL is that yes, you're expected to be polite to everyone, including the trolls and vandals. I couldn't support any potential admin who doesn't get something as fundamental to good Wikipedia governance as that - disagree with it all you want, and many clearly do, but the sole purpose of RfA is to identify who can be trusted to to enforce the rules as they are, not how they wish they were. Wikipedia already has a bucket-load of activist admins who enforce (or rather don't enforce) the rules based on what they'd like them to say, specifically on this idea that somehow it's OK to be an asshole to some people if you think they deserve it. They only act that way because they know they haven't a hope in hell of getting the rules changed to match how they want to enforce them, because their preferred versions are idiotic. Can you imagine the chaos if the real world worked that way? Second, I seriously doubt that someone who is "unable to write any decent content", assuming that's not down to something outside of his control like a disability, really has what it takes between the ears to make a good admin. Admin candidates should absolutely disagree with the idea that you need content creation to prove your capability, because as his essay makes clear, it's total nonsense. But don't for a second fall into the trap of assuming creating GAs, or even FAs, is remotely difficult or beyond the capability of the averagely intelligent - and admin candidates should at the very least, be averagely intelligent. All it takes is time to acquire and read the source, and master what little technical skills it takes. And as said elsewhere, the moderately difficult stuff, copyright and prose, is routinely handed off to experts anyway, so it's not like that's part of the core competency of a GA/FA writer.