User:Avraham

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Anscombe's quartet, a beautiful and elegant case for always visually inspecting your data.
Wikipedia:Babel
en This user is a native speaker of English.
en-5 This user is able to contribute with a professional level of English.
he-2 משתמש זה מסוגל לתרום ברמה בינונית של עברית.‏
tmr-3 משתמש הדא ממלל ארמיא דתלמודא בבלאה בדרגא מעליא.‏
Hebr-N
ש		 This user has a native-like understanding of the Hebrew alphabet.
Zmth-3
Integral.png		 This user has an advanced understanding of the Mathematical notation.
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Contents


Maintenance

Articles I attempt to maintain.

Wikipedia Philosophy

Editing

My philosophy in Wikipedia is "No data is better than garbage data." In statistics you know you cannot extrapolate too much from nothing; but given something, one is tempted to build complicated statistical models. Same with Wikipedia; I would rather have a smaller set of useful, verifiable (and verified), clean articles than a large set of borderline trash. This does not mean I prefer to throw out the baby with the bathwater; if an article is sufficiently notable, and has room for improvement, it should be kept. Unfortunately, in my experience, I have found that to be the exception, and not the rule. For every article like V. Kalyanasundaram, there are a hundred others that are blatant advertisement, or {{db-bio}}'s.

Updating references

One of my favorite wiki-pastimes is to find an article which is poorly referenced, and to update it with proper, and perhaps better, citations, like St. Petersburg paradox [1] and Anti-Zionism [2].

Sources

I am also a very strong believer in having sources in articles, and quoting them. When an article is unsourced, by nature it is suspect. If it can point to a verifiable source, it is as if it says "Go ahead, check it out." We need more articles of the latter type. There are too many unsourced, or poorly sourced articles that people may take for real research on Wikipedia.

Administration-related

If you need access to a Wikipedia article that has been deleted, ask me. If it's not a copyright violation, libel, or personal information, and has not been deleted as a suspected biographies of living persons violation, I will userfy the article for you.

Note that using the text to recreate any deleted article may automatically qualify them for speedy deletion, and copies of previously deleted content that are being used solely for long-term archival purposes may be subject to deletion as Wikipedia is not a free web host. The MediaWiki website has a list of wiki sites which may be used to host your content.


Thoughts on sysop and b'crat nominations

Text-x-generic.svg This is an essay. It is not a policy or guideline. Please update the page as needed, or discuss it on the talk page.

Over my time here in Wikipedia, as an editor and then an admin, I think I have finally crystallized my thoughts on RFAs and RFBs. In a nutshell, a request for adminship/bureaucratship is a request for the community to comment on the judgment and trustworthiness of the individual under discussion. Do we feel that the candidate will uphold wiki policy and guidelines where they exist, and will make reasoned decisions where policy and guideline is vague?

Wikipedia seems to have a tendency to regress to number counting and cold statistical analysis when faced with difficult decisions. See Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 79 for a prime example, although there are many others. Personally, I think that is an error. Anything that can be relegated to nothing more than bean-counting can, and should, be handed off to bots. We have admins and bureaucrats in Wikipedia because there are times we need a human being to make a decision. Usually, those times are when the decision will be unpopular. When we opine on RfAs, RfBs, and ArbCom elections, we are actually saying "we trust so-and-so's judgment, and are willing to allow him or her to make the difficult decisions."

Of course, egregious behavior needs to be addressed, which is why we have WP:ANI and WP:RfAR. Further, it is always a good idea for the admin or b'crat in question to discuss difficult issues beforehand, but that is not a requirement. Exercising judgment is what we ask our admins and b'crats to do, and if that judgment is exercised in a non-capricious, impartial, and reasoned fashion, we cannot fault them for that.

Ask yourself before you opine on a RFA/B/etc., "do I trust this person's judgment?" Then if you do, while you may disagree with it, and post vociferously why so when that occurs, remember that is why you placed your opinion on their nomination. And if you don't, then you should have acted on that during the nomination process.


Cross-wiki support

I am a steward of the Wikimedia Foundation and a sysop on the Wikimedia Commons and Meta.

Identity and secure communication

Unified login: Avraham is the unique login of this user for all public Wikimedia projects.
My PGP public key ID is 0xF80E29F9, expand for key:

If a key is signed by this one, it means that I have either met face-to-face or performed an encrypted challenge-response with the user.

The fingerprint of this key is 167C 063F 7981 A1F6 71EC ABAA 0D62 B019 F80E 29F9

If you would like to have your key signed, either email me or leave a message on my talk page. I will provide a level-0 signature for a successful encrypted challenge-response that proves the relationship between the key, the e-mail address associated with it, and the wikipedia user account. Anything more significant requires face-to-face meeting.

Committed identity: 19cb1cb9cc3170fe56da8484ac1e1e62a69fde78ebfdcfad7fad73031deb2b6d2e62b6a539587d29241b4d5f763e21a4e04621bd274f01cc0b9dc8f7535c1f7a is a SHA-512 commitment to this user's real-life identity.

Doppelgänger accounts

Humorous edits

Every once in a while, I come up with an edit which I (and usually only I) find funny.

Userboxes

Cscr-featured.svg This user helped promote Actuary to featured article status.
Symbol support vote.svg This user helped promote the article Jack Coggins to good article status.
Symbol support vote.svg This user helped promote the article Maximum spacing estimation to good article status.
Symbol support vote.svg This user helped promote the article Abbey Mills Mosque to good article status.
Admin mop.PNG This user is an administrator, bureaucrat, checkuser, and oversighter on the English Wikipedia. (verify)
Commons-logo.svg This user is an administrator and oversighter on Wikimedia Commons. (verify)
Wikimedia Community Logo.svg This user is a steward for the Wikimedia Foundation and an administrator on Meta. (verify)
Vista-evolution-1.4.png This user is a member of the Wikimedia OTRS team. (verify)
43,000+ This user has made over 43,000 contributions to Wikipedia. (total)
Wikignome crop.gif This editor is a WikiGnome.
SophieAndersonTakethefairfaceofWoman.jpg This user is a Wikifæry.
Template elf.png This user is a WikiÆlf.
127.0.0.0/8 This administrator understands and performs range blocks.
+ This user likes getting friendly notices.
{#if} This user understands and uses ParserFunctions.
{{t|3|c}} This user contributes to the template namespace with confidence, even with conditional templates.
R-3 This user is an advanced R programmer.
LaTeX logo.svg-2 This user is an intermediate LaTeX user.
xhtml-2 This user is an intermediate XHTML user.
css-1 This user is a beginning Cascading Style Sheets user.


Barnstars and other thoughtful gifts

Working Man's Barnstar.png The Working Man's Barnstar
Your dedication to the nightmarish task of updating the sources on circumcision is positively stunning. Hence this barnstar. Jakew 20:47, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
Barnstar of Humour3.png The Barnstar of Good Humor
For your attempt to cool down the discussion at [3] :-). --Kim Bruning 20:04, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar.png The Random-Acts-of-Kindness Barnstar
When I changed user names and was inadvertantly locked out of editting, you tried over and over to help me over a sustained period of time until final success. I really appreciate it. Thank you. LegitimateAndEvenCompelling 04:52, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar.png The Random-Acts-of-Kindness Barnstar
Thanks for going to bat for my little effort re: Deborah Frisch. Sinsblog 14:44, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Barnstar of Reversion2.png The RickK Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
I award you this barnstar for your tireless and effective vandal combat. Best regards. --Payple 15:40, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Featured article star.svg

Avraham has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian,
and therefore, I've officially declared today as Avraham's day!
For being such a beautiful person and great Wikipedian,
enjoy being the Star of the day, dear Avi!

Love,
Phaedriel
00:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

A record of your Day will always be kept here.
The Half Star of Cooperation. For your cooperation alongside Fayssal at WP:CSN.
The admins' T-shirt. Acalamari 22:22, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
Barnstar of Humour3.png The Barnstar of Good Humor
Aprils fools day was a blast. Loads of users lightened up to have good old fashion fun. I want to thank you for taking part in editing this page in particular and even though I may not know you, embrace the same talk pages, or even edit with you in the near future, I'd like to award you this Barnstar for making Wikipedia a fun environment in which to contribute. Until next year. :) SynergeticMaggot (talk) 13:40, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
Vitruvian Barnstar.png The da Vinci Barnstar
I'm thoroughly delighted to offer this barnstar (of which I have never crossed paths with before) to Avraham for excellent work in almost every area on en.wp. Apparently this barnstar is to be awarded to those that oil the Wikipedia cogs well and perform their functions brilliantly. This then, is well deserved. Seraphim Whipp was our last nominee (and only child to date :P) but I hear we have a new one… :) Rudget (review) 09:08, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
Socratic Barnstar.png The Socratic Barnstar
For your great answers and communication with other users throughout the RfB. Acalamari 20:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar.png


The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
is hereby awarded to Avi for being so kind and wasting his precious WP time resolvng my archiving problems. brewcrewer (yada, yada) 22:32, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Featured article star.svg

Avraham has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian,
and therefore, I've officially declared today as Avraham's day!
For being such a beautiful person and great Wikipedian,
enjoy being the Star of the day, dear Avi!

Peace,
Rlevse
~~~~~

A record of your Day will always be kept here.
Civility barnstar.png Civility Award
For being kind enough to solve the mystery of my 3 deletes. It put my mind at rest that I had not done incorrect edits, as such. BSTemple (talk) 17:32, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
WikiDefender Barnstar.png The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
For defending the Values of Wikipedia----mbz1 (talk) 16:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
Barnstar-atom3.png The E=mc² Barnstar
For your simply awesome work on Nicholas Metropolis LoveMonkey (talk) 14:22, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Admin Barnstar.png The Admin's Barnstar
Thanks for sticking around at SPI even though the bot is down. It's more work, with suddenly less clerks and CUs, so thanks! Nathan T 12:21, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
Resilient Barnstar.png The Resilient Barnstar
For patiently and persistently explaining policy and guideline, for putting up with an awful lot of abuse in the process, and for the boundless good humour that I've come to see as characteristic of you, I think you've earned this Resilient Barnstar. Jakew (talk) 19:00, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
No spam barnstar.png The Anti-Spam Barnstar
Many thanks for your tireless efforts at SPI, keeping Wikipedia clear of abuse and other nonsense.--Hu12 (talk) 16:10, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Admin mop.PNG Avraham, Thank you for the way you and the other Crats are handling the RfB . . . regardless of the outcome.

Thanks Again - Ret.Prof (talk) 23:16, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
WikiDefender Barnstar.png The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar
Awarded to Avraham for his willingness to sacrifice of his time and for his extraordinary efforts making Wikipedia a safe and fair place to write and edit and for ensuring total fairness whenever the tide of unreason rears its misguided head. Whenever the applecart may be up-ended Avraham will judge fairly and set it straight. Congratulations! IZAK (talk) 01:22, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
Mensch5.png The Barnstar of Integrity
I was looking over a couple of your edits, and was really impressed by them, especially the diff on the "Anti-Zionism" article that you linked to from your user page. This is such a difficult and polarized issue, and I cannot even tell what you personally believe from your very neutral and excellent edits, which greatly improved the quality of that article. I was also impressed by your participation in the debate over whether User:Palestine Remembered should be blocked, because I think that too often users with strong points of view get blocked when they are willing to constructively work on improving the quality of the encyclopedia. Well done, you seem to be a great Wikipedian with a remarkably even temper. CordeliaNaismith (talk) 01:35, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
Invisible Barnstar.png The Invisible Barnstar
Thank you for all you do that the general public does not see Moxy (talk) 20:44, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
SpecialBarnstar.png The Special Barnstar
For being willing to act as a mentor, despite the difficulty it would entail. While it is unfortunate that the mentorship was not allowed to progress, and the user in question reverted to actions that caused the blocks in the first place, your willingness to extend the offer of help and put yourself in an uncomfortable position to try and better the English Wikipedia project is a testament to your character and a asset to the project. Thank you. -- Spartaz Humbug! 16:26, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
Barnstar-abc.png The Helping Hand Barnstar
This is technically for people helping "new editors" but thank you for your recent assistance. The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 01:40, 18 September 2010 (UTC)
Meissen-teacup pinkrose01.jpg Thank you for always having been civil, for not having filled the conversation with ad hominems, or misquoted/misread either Talk or sources, or refused to give straight answers. I wish you well and enjoy seeing your contributions on Wikipedia in other articles. In ictu oculi (talk) 11:41, 15 August 2011 (UTC)
Baklava - Turkish special, 80-ply.JPEG For fixing my top icons, which is of course the job stewards are meant to do... :) Cerejota (talk) 00:19, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

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