Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/BusterD 2

Question(s) by Herostratus

@Herostratus: You can't ask three questions in one. Chess (talk) (please use {{reply to|Chess}} on reply) 23:44, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

@Chess: Well, it's really just one question, I mean I could have formatted it as prose: "Will you leave yourself open to a future reconfirmation (also called "recall") by placing yourself in Category:Wikipedia administrators open to recall, and (if yes) describing the conditions under which you would be open to recall, either the "standard offer" described at Wikipedia:Administrators open to recall/Sample process (which is that a reconfirmation RfA would be triggered on the request of six editors in good standing), or some other (for instance, User:Lar/Accountability has an alternate criteria/process, and links to others are found at Wikipedia:Administrators open to recall/Admin criteria, or you can make up your own), and (also if yes) are you willing to state that you will stand by your pledge, regardless of any text written anywhere about the criteria or procedure being after-the-fact optional or withdrawable-from or negotiable or subject to later reconsideration and so forth."

Would that be better? It's rather a long and involved sentence then, so I thought that a list was better. Or I could have used bullets instead of A, B, and C, but the letters mae it easier to refer to specific points if needed, I think. Herostratus (talk) 23:56, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

No matter how complicated you make the question, this is still little more than "under what circumstances would you resign?" I don't believe the community, nor the bureaucrats, have ever considered recall statements made at RfA binding. – bradv^🍁 00:03, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

They are not binding. The recall process is a toothless old dog, as it should be. HighInBC ^{Need help? Just ask.} 00:06, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

If it ever comes to it, we'll see. I would point out that neither (most of) the other language Wikis, nor any other properly functioning organization on the face of the earth, with some exceptions, offers jobs for life. That's just a simple fact. It is.

So, one exception to the "no job for life upon hire" rubric is Federal Courts, and some (but not most, I think) state courts in the United States. Another is blue collar union jobs.

However, if I may. I am familiar with teacher's unions. I think teacher's unions are great and actually a bulwark of the Republic. So, typically, the deal that teacher's unions have worked out with the school districts is, a new hire has a three year probation period. At the end of each of the first three years, you can be let go. If you're kept on for a fourth year, you have a job for life. And fine.

Sometimes teacher just don't work out (or, they're great, but the principal just doesn't like them), and they're let go after the first year or the second. But typically, at the end of the third year, the teacher's performance is scrutinized very carefully, because it's a GO/NOGO decision: try again with someone else, or give the person a 40 year job for life. And fine.

What would be insane would for that decision to have to be made at hire. Life doesn't work like that. You can't run any organization like that. People can have good resumes and charm in the interview but still turn out not to be a good fit when the rubber hits the road.

(It's true that for all these -- judges, teachers, and union members -- there's an out in that if they engage in actually criminal behavior and so forth they can be impeached. We have an equivalent at ArcCom, but that doesn't work well for our purposes. In my opinion.

But yes, you are right. It is possible that even a pledge made upon one's honor can be broken, in defiance of all norms of proper behavior of normal humans, and no actual physical means of enforcement can be deployed. But at least the person can be shamed in front of the world and in front of the mirror. At least that. And you never know how ArbCom is going to treat someone who has dishonored herself. You might be surprised, who knows.

My experience is that people are not going to push it like that. It's only happened once. The usual outcome is that a person whose is recalled and sees the writing the writing in the wall that maybe they won't win thru resigns, usually with little comment. But probably dismayed and hurting, because that's how people are, all of us, and that sucks and is sad, but the Wikipedia is not a respecter of persons. We cannot forgo inviting editors who have turned out to not be good at adminning continue doing that. We are very influential and owe it to humanity to police ourselves and achieve the highest level of excellence that we can.

Of course, the reconfirmation procedure will presumably be deployed very very rarely. Perhaps once a year or twice, perhaps once every three or four years, perhaps never. I hope so. That would be great! And I expect so. Whether the existence of the the pledge will cause an admin to maybe think twice before too regularly acting without thoroughly thinking a situation thru... we'll never know. But maybe. Can't make it less' likely anyway.

And I mean, we never want a User:DangerousPanda type situation, even if that's only once every five years or ten, do we. Do we. If you're opposed to admin reconfirmation, you think that the User:DangerousPanda situation was handled OK. If you think that, then own it. Say it out loud. And in that case we live on different planets, then. We have nothing much, really, to say to each other. Look, it's a political issue. I'm not going to convince you all. I'm talking to the audience. We'll see how it plays out.

I'll say this: we need more admins, I think. I'm seeing too many hasty decisions. The numbers I'm seeing at RfA have are not sustainable. The last RfA was 217 to 0. That's horrible. We need a lot more candidates, which means people winning 175-60. If only the very few best-of-the-best, people who can win 217-0, are coming forward... this is not good, not good at all. I don't mind voting for a marginal candidate if I know she can be invited to consider that maybe her skill set and strengths were a better match for creating content or doing non-writing tasks that don't require admin tools, with something to back that up if it comes to it. If over time this ever becomes understood to be the norm, I reckon we'd see a lot more candidates come forward. We need that.

And I mean a candidate -- even a good one -- that feels entitled to a job for life, hmmm. Even if the candidate promises this and promises that and their resume looks good and they charm in the interview, you have to wonder why they're insisting on a job for life. User:DangerousPanda promised a very good number of pleasant-sounding things in his RfA, after all.

It's just business, people. We're a publishing business, a large important and influential one. It behooves us to be prudent in how we run ourselves. Whether any significant number of other editors come, in time, to consider all this reasonable, I don't know. Maybe. If not, you all have nothing to worry about, then. Herostratus (talk) 02:04, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Before June, I agreed with you that we needed more RfAs passing 175-60. Believed a lot of optimistic things before June. At any rate, I don't think your question permits the passing of more borderline RfAs, nor do I think the fact most passes are so overwhelming is a sign those are flawless candidates -- moreso that RfA is so intensely rare now that no one wants to oppose. I think your questions aren't having the effect of borderline candidates going "oh, I can run and it'll be fine because Herostratus will support me if I'm up for recall", it's "oh god, I can never run because people are going to constantly hound me for flaws to kick me out, on top of the horrible torture nightmare RfA where people try to maximize my suffering and drive me off the site". Vaticidalprophet 03:40, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Wait, what happened in June?? Now I'm scared!

So OK, fair points. There's a lot of political stuff here, good to hear from someone willing to engage dispassionately on the merits.

Yes, so I'll consider what you say. I have thought on this for a long time and my opinions are not lightly held, so that's all I can promise.

So, I don't know. This is long-term effort to try to change the paradigm. It's not like a bunch of candidates are going to jump up. It's more like over time there's a different mindset. I dunno, maybe never happen. I don't want to give up too easily.

It used to be that anybody who'd been here like five years was assumed to probably be eligible for the tools if they wanted them. Worked fine I think, and still could if there wasn't life tenure. I dunno, the other Wikipedias seem to do OK. Some of them have all their admins go thru regular reconfirmation RfA's I think, and they manage to thrive. I'm not recommending that for us, but still,

I'm tired of seeing AfD closes that look like they were done in fifteen seconds. Maybe it's laziness or burnout, but I assume it's overwork.

One thing I don't understand is the bit about how it's so stressful. An RfA like this one (and most) is a lovefest and fun. Being an admin is not stressful, it's a stress remover because you have more control over your environment, people treat you with more respect, and if you run into jerks you can give them hell with something to back it up. It's great!

A reconfirmation RfA should also be a fun lovefest, if you haven't been fucking up or being a jerk. Not so much if you have been, but I mean, what do you expect.

"oh god, I can never run because people are going to constantly hound me for flaws to kick me out, on top of the horrible torture nightmare RfA where people try to maximize my suffering and drive me off the site"... I mean, it doesn't work like that. Nobody does that. You have to have a little toughness to be an admin on this world-class website I think, if you're that timid maybe you're not cut out for it.

There are plenty of admins in Category:Admins open to recall, and it's fine. We've had this for a long time, and none of that bad stuff has happened. There've been a few petitions for recall, some failed so no problem, and some the admin resigned right off, and sometimes quit the project. These were either bad admins or people who can't handle any criticism I guess, so it's probably a net gain for the project. Herostratus (talk) 05:50, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

What happened in June was the other RfA to run that month -- the one that closed with not entirely different numbers to 175-60, and which I've since described as "monstrous" and "torturous" and "a concentrated attempt on the part of a lot of good people to be as bad as possible". Most RfAs aren't like that one -- we're all very lucky for it -- but unfortunately sometimes it does work like that, and people do that, and the community turns itself inside out trying to be the worst version of itself it can be. Bad RfAs stick in people's heads a lot longer and a lot deeper than the good ones and colour their perceptions of the process in much more vivid paints, and RfA discourse needs to find a reasonably healthy way of addressing this, which it generally doesn't (instead swinging between "everything is working exactly how it should" and "every RfA, including the smoothest, is a nightmare without respite").

What does hold true through all of it is that there are a lot of directions that people come to RfA from trying to make it suck less that unintentionally make it suck more. Extensive recall discussion seems to put people off the topic, if we're to over-extrapolate from February to May; "so you're going to make sure we can kick you out, right?" doesn't seem to put a lot of people in a good mood during a process that already puts many of its participants on edge and does seem to make many people feel stressed/targeted even when theirs are going well; the whole "modifying the recall process while asking everyone about recall" shambles, well, you know how that went already, and I don't think it's going to be a big help to your broad attempts to change the political discourse on the topic. There's a lot of complexity here, as you in some ways know better than me (you are the guy who got recalled, after all...), and boiling it down to this level of simplicity combined with intentional political-dialogue attempts is IMO not a particularly useful way to have the conversation. Vaticidalprophet 08:54, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

I don't regret my oppose at that RfA. That was a shitshow; but that person should not have been an admin and there was a very low chance the nominee would've become an admin had it lasted the full 7 days. I don't care if the nominee said stupid shit in the past. What they said in the past was something they no longer believe in. What I did care about was the hateful things they said on the Wikipedia Discord. People said mean things at that RfA because the candidate said mean things. The candidate said on Discord during a discussion about the IRA's actions during the troubles that "oppressors exist to be killed by the oppressed" and expressed a belief that the existence of Israel was "intolerable". The second was during a discussion completely unrelated to Israel. If you want to talk about how bad that RfA was, sure, whatever. Go against the wishes of the former candidate who wants people to stop talking about it. But if you're going to start saying that the reason why the RfA failed was "a concentrated attempt on the part of a lot of good people to be as bad as possible" that's BS and completely irrelevant discussion for this RfA. Chess (talk) (please use {{reply to|Chess}} on reply) 22:23, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

@Chess:, this kind of reinforces my point. I didn't attend that RfA, but if I had, I would probably have voted against the candidate if I was voting for a job for life, whereas if we had an effect reconfirmation process I probably would have. Add in 10 or 15 people like me (and you never know, maybe someday), and candidate would have passed, giving us a much-need admin who would *probably* be OK, and an easy way to reverse if he didn't. Win-win. Herostratus (talk) 00:47, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

@Vaticidalprophet:. There is politics here. Of course there is. First of all, all human endeavors have politics, and second of all it's stone-obvious that we do also here, to me at least. To ignore elephants in rooms is not helpful, and to abjure politics when others are practicing it is to unilaterally disarm and give up control of one's destiny. And third of all, politics is fine. Politics is how things get done and compromises are made and things move forward.

Alright. If I'm hearing you right, you're on the job-for-life camp. And that's fine. You're free give a resounding support vote to candidates even if they make it clear they won't be open to recall, and you certainly won't be alone.

Your particular reason (if I'm reading you right) is that RfA is kind of broken and requiring candidates to pledge to be open to recall will stress them too much and break RfA even worse. Reasonable. There's lots to say about that, but not now. All things equal I'd much rather reduce RfA stress than add to it, yes.

So, then what's your solution? If RfA is not excellent, how to improve. Don't suggest changes to policies, because none can ever pass, we know that. Only policy that is very popular generally can pass, especially if well-attended. That goes triple for anything the Admin Corps and their uh fans disfavor.

That leaves individual action, which this is. Right now just me, but I know at least a few others are on board with me. But I'm all ears for other solutions.

So, in the RfA you refer to, that's a good example. There were various things raised, some kind of silly, some not. I didn't participate in that RfA, but I had, and looking at the overall vibe an everything, I very likely would not have voted for that person if it was job or life, no. I sense maybe a few-percent chance that a possible non-excellent attitude could develop. You never know. If the person was open to recall... I probably would have voted for them. So that's a great example. That's just me... but suppose there were ten other editors of like mind. Someday there will be I hope. Ten's a really small group, but... let's see that could move 114-50 to 124-40... which is over 75%... so...

Lack of experience? Fixable. Lack of skills, fixable or live-withable. Not very active? Not a net negative. Attitude problem? That's different. Enough so that "a few percent" is too high a risk for me, if it's a job for life. And really there are few candidates who don't have a few percent chance of not working out.

FWIW I do not support this current candidate, whose page we're on, no. His answer to the question gave a high bar that would be basically impossible to achieve, and "be open to" is insufficient for a set-in-stone pledge; as a practical matter it amounts to "no". I didn't vote because the time is not right. What the future brings, who knows. Herostratus (talk) 00:47, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Fun political maneuver that I think adminship should always be a job for life. ;) I think a binding recall procedure is "complicated" and in most cases not necessary to prevent adminship from being retained by people well past the point they should have it. There are obviously exceptions, but the biggest such I can think of are of people who were promoted so long ago most of the websites that make up integral parts of the modern internet didn't even exist yet, under far different RfAs, and solving the "net negative legacy admin" problem is something outside the scope of RfA reform per se. To flip the political script a bit, I think expecting that a candidate submit to a formal recall procedure is a no-confidence vote, and I think conflating formal recall procedures with "will not remain an admin if the tide has clearly turned" is holding an astoundingly low opinion of someone's character. Requiring that people jump through hoops (none of the common recall procedures strike me as any less hoopy than Arbcom) to get rid of admins who have abused the community trust, rather than more informal methods where people who are trusted by the rogue in question bring up their concerns outside the context of pitchfork-wielding mobs, is requiring the most frustratingly bureaucratic way of handling a net-negative admin possible. (There's a lot you can do with simply asking an admin doing wrong if he's open to recall, without starting any recall procedure.) If I were an admin, and people I trust told me I'd fucked up, I'd listen -- I wouldn't demand a whole ritualistic procedure with signatories that works out equally bureaucratic to just dragging me to Arbcom. I don't think transferring the burden of bureaucracy actually improves the community's role in desysopping. Vaticidalprophet 03:35, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

• I'm endlessly amused by the whole "job for life" canard. Admins are volunteers like everyone else here. They are volunteering to do a shit job, that requires this awful process to attain, and some people would like to make the situation even more hostile by bullying them into making promises to be bound to a shitty, unused process that hasn't actually accomplished a single thing in a decade? That's just terrible behavior. Frankly I think Herostratus should probably be topic banned from recall, both the pages related to it (where he has tried to rewrite it to make it binding with no consensus to do so) and asking these bullying questions at RFA. He is clearly obsessed with using dirty tricks and bullying tactics to make it appear to be relevant and useful when it obviously is not. Enough is enough with this nonsense. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:01, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

• I will also add a TBAN for Hipocrite for their repeated irrelevant, disruptive opposes at multiple RfA's as JBL pointed out.[1] RfAs are about candidates, their past contributions and their soft skills. If someone regularly disrupts this delicate community selection process to bitch about the entire Wikipedia system, and does it deliberately in such a way as to add further stress on the candidates, they should be banned from taking part in the process. Simple. — kashmīrī ^TALK 21:07, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Problem with counter

There are 48 supports as of this writing, but the counter is inexplicably stuck at 45. JavaHurricane 10:09, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

JavaHurricane, Cyberbot has thrown a wobbly and isn't updating this RfA, so people are doing it manually. I have pinged Cyberpower to let him know there's a problem. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 10:51, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the info! JavaHurricane 12:19, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Just as an update to this, the counter has been switched to use a module, which means that bot edits will no longer be required to keep the information up-to-date. Primefac (talk) 21:05, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

This

This dubious edit might need fixing. --- Possibly ☎ 10:10, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

@Possibly: I've removed it, pinging Aenalfroth -- Asartea ^{Talk | Contribs} 10:20, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. That was their 11th edit on a sleeper account that has only been used for an hour today. I'm guessing this is a good place for them to get that checkuser attention they crave. --- Possibly ☎ 10:24, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

I have blocked the account, based on their username and the shock image hidden in their signature. I left a note to the crats that they only have 11 edits(which are mostly adding and removing the same vandalism). HighInBC ^{Need help? Just ask.} 10:39, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

@HighInBC: thanks, appreciate it -- Asartea ^{Talk | Contribs} 10:48, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, there's no reason to keep that. Primefac (talk) 11:03, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Note: based on the username that account is an LTA. JavaHurricane 12:47, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Not that it really matters under what we tag, but HighInBC for reference I've re-blocked just to remove the link to the sig/violation itself, since it kind of puts it way out in the open... Primefac (talk) 12:56, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Account has been CU-blocked and locked. JavaHurricane 16:32, 4 July 2021 (UTC)