User talk:Wikidudeman: Difference between revisions

I hope you become an administrator! Gosh you deserve to become one badly! Becuz, you know, ur name is very cool "wikidudeman", and you've got well over 19,000 valid edits and stuff. Very cool, and very impressive aswell. Cheers! Angela from the Blue (talk) 16:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

communes

I hope you plan to add some more content to these articles than just stating their names. DGG (talk) 17:57, 21 January 2008 (UTC) It just seemed to mee that you probably had some basic geographic information right at hand, and could add it. of course such stubs are sustainable even without it.DGG (talk) 17:06, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

WP:BN

I wanted to give you a heads-up that I have suggested the 'crats extend your RFA given the sticky patch it has run into. Spartaz ^Humbug! 18:39, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

admin consensus

Why did you remove yourself from the admin candidacy and place yourself in Wikipedia:Unsuccessful adminship candidacies/W? In three hours I was going to promote you to admin. Kingturtle (talk) 19:11, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In three hours I'm sure 10 or 20 more people would have changed their votes to oppose based on obvious and disgusting misinterpretation of my posts from several months ago. It's just not worth it. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 19:14, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi WDM, I honestly don't understand the problem with this round of RFA. I don't understand the changing of votes, the original opposes, and in general, what the problems are. Anyway, I hope you try again, I'll continue to support you. WLU (talk) 19:18, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Disgusting misinterpretation? That's nice. So, several very capable and hardworking editors are disgusting. Thanks. I'll pass along your comments to those "disgusting" editors such as myself. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 19:19, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Here's another example. I say that the editors misinterpretation of my posts are disgusting and Orangemarlin interprets it as me saying the editors themselves are disgusting. It's no wonder the RFA went the way it did. Reading comprehension does a lot of good.Wikidudeman ^(talk) 19:21, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be absolutely crystal clear here (language does not work well over the internet): Wikidudeman is saying that his posts were misinterpreted as disgusting statements. He is not saying that it was disgusting to misinterpret them, nor is he saying that those misinterpreting them were disgusting. Geometry guy 19:32, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment to Orangemarlin. You should "unwatchlist" Wikidudeman. You obviously get upset at whatever he does and says. Right or wrong, you have your opinion and he has his. So just stop watching him. Go about your business here, which is to improve Wikipedia in the best way you know how, and stop adding grief/stress to your time here. Just my $.02. Keeper | 76 20:48, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, I guess you're a shrink, because you obviously have insight into my level of stress and my being upset. Thank you very much for the free clinical evaluation and advice. You are a wonderful person. I'm in tears that a fellow Wikipedian can be so thoughtful. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 22:55, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Knock of the sarcasm buddy - please. If it doesn't help, don't post it. And if it's not about Wikidudeman you can use your own talk pages, not his.... Pedro : Chat 23:02, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I happened on this RfA by chance and was eager to support when I found it. I carefully read the opposes, but they did not change my mind regarding supporting the RfA. I was more than ready to counter the oppose arguments, based on my own experience. Then I hit the edit button, and the page changed colour! Next time, I hope I will be quicker.

Wikidudeman is to be admired for working on controversial articles and attempting to steer them towards NPOV. This generates enemies among those who have a strong opinion about a particular subject, and at controversial articles, many editors have a strong opinion. An RfA needs a thick skin, and I'm sad about what has happened here. Geometry guy 19:29, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I helped to loose a fine admin from your first time round. I think this just re-affirms how wrong I was in your initial RfA and how wrong the whole process is now. I'm gutted, pissed off and generally upset (I'm trying to be mild). The only hope I have is that you do not loose faith with the work here. My sincerest and best wishes to an editor who is prepared more than almost all (including many admins and certainly including myself) to take on the difficult and conflict ridden areas. Your forced withdrawl to meet your own standards is a net loss to this project and shame on those who can't keep the bigger picture in view when commenting at RfA, again a lesson I have now learned. Pedro : Chat 20:13, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Pedro. You are a very capable editor. I too !voted support, then saw the pileone from voices from the past, and looked at the diffs presented. After reading the comments, I decided to stay in your "support group." You are rare among editors that you are willing to take on heated topics, and reading your diffs from way back when, it appeared to me that you were approaching the subjects with reverence towards Wiki-policy and not reverance towards any particular POV. You appeared to use good faith, and you appeared to let things go when consensus went against you. I was saddened to see you withdraw, even more saddened to see some of your supporters jump ship over things that happened so very long ago (by wikistandards, a year is an eon.) The irony is that many people become admins because they've never been in any conflicts and have no good answer to Q3. And why don't they have conflicts? Because they avoid the very articles (murky waters) that you dive straight into. And because of you're bravery, you've been watchlisted (apparently) by a group of editors deadset against you because your POV doesn't match their POV. For shame. I was hoping that because you explicitly stated in Q3 the exact conflict that those opposers dredged up again that it would not have the effect it did. With no hard feelings towards those that opposed, I personally hope you stick around and try the RfA again if that is your wish. If you only edit and never become a janitor, you are probably better off. The "tools" are no big deal, cause more problems than they solve it seems lately, and you have proven that you can contribute in exceptional ways without them. Best of luck to you, Wikiedudeman. Happy editing, Keeper | 76 20:48, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well that was one hell of a 12 hours. I don't recall seeing any RfA run into the sand like that. It's a shame that the stuff about the David Irving hoo-ha only emerged at this very late stage: I believe that had it been aired earlier you might have had a good chance to put what happened (after all, 9 months ago) into some context. I'm sorry my withdrawal of support added another stone to the avalanche: I was hoping your reply would allow me to restore it but quite understandably you'd had enough by that point. I just wanted to post here to express my sympathy over what must have been, by any standards, a gruelling and unpleasant process. Very best wishes, Kim Dent-Brown ^(Talk) 20:54, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The ONLY reason that I ever wanted to become an administrator is so that I could shave a few minutes off of the time between me spotting a vandal and that vandal being blocked as well as the time it took to get other admin tasks done such as edit requests etc. That's it. It was never a big deal to me and if so many editors want to get all worked up over my interpretation of a word from a year ago or my using a racist website to verify that a racist belief exists then it's not worth it. I'm not going to try for administrator again, ever. Simply having a few extra capabilities isn't worth all of the hassle.

At this point in time I'm essentially done working on controversial articles and fighting tooth and nail to end disputes between POV pushers, making countless enemies in the process, and in the end accomplishing nothing but a headache. Take the Homeopathy article for instance which I spent months building up to GA status from scratch with the help of only a few. It has been protected for over a month and was just recently unprotected. Edit wars WILL start back up immediately and the article will only be re-protected with no progress made and probably a lot lost. This process will continue on and off until the article is again no longer a GA (it probably isn't anymore) and the months of work that I put into it will go down the drain. This is only one example among dozens and I simply don't have the patience or time to deal with such articles or with editors who frequent them.

I'm not sure of my future on wikipedia but most likely I will simply be editing and improving only the most uncontroversial articles every now and then. I won't be fighting vandalism anymore (unless it appears on a page I'm watching), I won't watch newpages anymore, I won't be checking new usernames anymore, I won't be mediating disputes anymore and attempting to get POV pushers to work together anymore, I'll let the people who think I am not fit to become an administrator do all of that stuff. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 18:42, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This post makes me feel awful. I do not blame you for feeling this way; I will never be voted to be an admin myself since I have made legions of enemies here. I think your work on Homeopathy was incredible and we would not have made the progress we did if you had not made such a Herculean effort. I do not want you to think that people do not appreciate it, because I certainly do, and I know several others do as well. Maybe we did not express it clearly enough, and that is not to our credit.

I would certainly support you for another RfA attempt, which might never come I suppose, and I wouldnt blame you for not wanting to go through that again. However, I think that people will dredge up bad material from the past and raise questions, and these have to be explained clearly and addressed so people can weigh this questionable material and come to terms with it. If revealed early, it can help people to come to terms with it, and realize what it represents.

This entire episode is an example of things that we need to correct on Wikipedia.--Filll (talk) 03:23, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wholeheartedly agree. Dude, I know your work in trying to settle controversial issues has been extremely valuable, particularly in settling arguments and being an effective mediator regarding content relating to such subjects. Yeah, I've jumped the gun a few times myself, and I can't fault you for when others choose to interpret what you say in an unfortunate way. I can't fault you for dropping work with controversial issues, either, under the circumstances. Why get more undeserved heat and aggrevation than you already have? I guess all I can really do is say that I regret the outcome because it was not what you deserved, and that I hope you can continue despite the strange circumstances. John Carter (talk) 18:12, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I feel bad about the RfA

I am very sorry. I think that it was just too much to digest in a day or so. A bit more explanation and people would have been able to understand it or come to terms with it. Even an apology might have helped I think. I think you did an incredible job on homeopathy and I think you are one of the best editors on Wikipedia that we have. I realize that your knowledge and understanding of NPOV might have changed considerably in 10+ months (mine has, for sure). I am sure most people will be happy to support you the next time, but they need reassurance that you understand what is troubling to people about those diffs, and that you didn't mean anything bad by it, and would do things differently now. I am very sorry, once again.--Filll (talk) 23:47, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am so sorry to learn what happened. Mine passed today with 40 support, 9 oppose and 6 neutrals. I was so sure you had made it, and I was shocked when I checked today. Bummer! You deserve to have it man! Cheer up! The world goes on. -- Alexf^{(Talk/Contribs)} 02:51, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I feel very bad about this as well, its a pity this happened after my Wikipedia Weekly interview, or I wouldn't have been so sanguine in my comments on how RfAs are assessed. This must a a real kick in the teeth for you. Tim Vickers (talk) 16:44, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I had some pretty solid feelings about the RFA process after my first RFA and after seeing numerous of the most qualified candidates fail miserably and the most unqualified candidates get nearly unanimous support, however this time it made it concrete for me. This incident has also caused me to take a deeper look at many of other wikipedia processes in general as well as the entire wikipedia "culture" and all I can say is that it is a good thing this happened sooner than later, otherwise I might still be wasting my time on lofty pursuits like I have in the past here. One of the main problems is the RFA process in general. The idea behind the RFA was that editors could ask the community for admin status and if they believed the editor asking could be trusted with it then they would give it to them, and that it would not be a big deal at all. However the RFA process, like any similar process, has turned into simply a popularity vote.

Editors who are popular and who have the least enemies become admins, editors who are unpopular and who have the most enemies don't. Generally speaking the editors with the least enemies are those editors who walk on glass around POV pushers and generally don't cross them. The editors with the most enemies (editors like myself) are editors who frequently involve themselves into disputes and in turn make enemies. Given the fact that in many articles there are often two very opposing Point of views, it's impossible to make everyone happy, no matter what you do. Given these facts, a good majority of editors walk on egg shells here and don't do or say anything that might make someone not like them. They avoid disputes and always go with the flow, never disagreeing, never objecting, just another editor who said "support" or "oppose" or "keep" or "delete" along with all of the rest. After a while such editors Request adminship and other editors see that they have a lot of edits and have been here several months and then "support" them. Other editors, just like the editors running for adminship come along and "support" them since they see a lot of supports, without ever taking a serious look at the editors experience. The editor running for adminship becomes administrator, nothing having much of any experience with disputes, and when this editor is needed to solve disputes, this editor does a miserable job at it and causes even more problems.

While there are a lot of good administrators out there, Tim Vickers being one of them, there are even more who don't know what the hell they are doing, and that number is increasing weekly. The only way to solve it would be to abolish the entire RFA system and simply have Bureaucrats(who should be more common) grant admin status to editors who they know and have experience with and that be that. If they don't do well with the tools then they are taken away as easily as they were given. That's it. But of course this won't happen. Any such a thing would surely need to go up "for a vote" and would surely be voted down by the same people who simply "support" or "oppose" based on how many supports or opposes are already there. A lot of supports means they support, A lot of opposes means they oppose. And the process continues itself. Of course for such an idea the initial reaction would be oppose since wikipedians in general, I have experienced, don't like change.

Where am I going with all of this ranting? Nowhere. Just expressing my opinions on a process and culture in general that seems to work against group psychology. While some might think that I'm just sore because of the way my RFA went, they would actually be right also, It does bother me a lot that given all of the work I've put into wikipedia and the time I have put into it attempting to get people to work together and to resolve disputes, so many editors don't even believe I am responsible enough to have admin tools. Though as I've stated before, most of the editors who opposed me were editors who I have crossed paths with in the past and who for one reason or another have held a grudge.

Anyway...I've just wasted another 15 minutes. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 00:36, 25 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"simply have Bureaucrats(who should be more common) grant admin status to editors who they know and have experience with and that be that. If they don't do well with the tools then they are taken away as easily as they were given. That's it." You are very right. ——Martin^phi ☎ Ψ Φ—— 00:42, 25 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Fascinating rant, and it's great to play the victim, isn't it? The reason a large number of individuals changed their vote was because of the David Irving episode. Your edits appeared to be anti-semitic and racist. Your use of Stormfront, a Neo-Nazi, White supremacist organization, as a reliable source was reprehensible. Many of the opposes were Jewish editors on Wikipedia (myself included), and will not countenance anti-Semitism, either subtle or obvious. I give no good faith to racism in any form, and all we asked of you was to explain your reasoning--maybe we misinterpreted what you did, but we deserved an explanation at edits that could be interpreted as racist. Attacking the process rather than owning up to what you had done only confirms to many of us that you are, in fact, misguided about NPOV or worse yet, a racist. Remember, I supported you up until Slrubenstein showed diffs as to your edits on David Irving (and Slrubenstein and I don't get along on much on this project). Then a landslide of very respected editors, whom I trust implicitly, jumped ship from supporting you. Then, in a fit of immaturity or righteous indignation (hard to tell), you quit. Of course, who knows how many more editors were going to move to oppose in that last two hours; on the other hand, maybe we were all full of crap, and a bunch of editors would have moved to support. So, you can continue to play the victim, a persona that many racists utilize, or you can come clean about what you were thinking when you used Stormfront as your reliable source. You don't have to answer me, or you do, your choice. I've battled you so many times on NPOV and ownership of articles that I guess you don't give a crap as to what I think. I'm just telling you what the background noise is. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 18:15, 26 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is what I was referring to above. I and many others were glad to support you until the David Irving talk page discussion was exposed. Then, for people to feel comfortable supporting you, they need an explanation, an apology, something. And they probably need enough time to be able to digest your apology or explanation. That is all. --Filll (talk) 18:34, 26 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Orangemarlin, You clearly have reading compression issues, so I won't fault you for that. However you should try to pay attention to what I am saying closely so that perhaps you can understand exactly why I did what I did. I was unsure about referring to David Irving as a "discredited historian" simply because I was unsure about whether or not someone could still be a "historian" even if most of what they said was discredited. That's it. You interpret that as antisemitism. You clearly don't have a clue what antisemitism is. If you want to attack people like myself who do things that you disagree with as antisemitic then you're just playing the race card and are a race baiter. Pure and simple.

The reason I used Stormfront.com as a source was not because I thought anything they said was reliable, it was because I was using it as a reference to support the fact that such people with such beliefs exist. That is it. It would be like using Mein Kampf as a source for a statement about Hitlers beliefs and then being attacked as a racist for using Mein Kampf as a source. The absurdity of that is beyond comprehension.

The problem isn't me, It's you and others like you who want to interpret something as benign as the edits I made as racist simply because you don't like them. You're right about one thing though, I don't care about what you think. I've had more than enough experience with you in the past to take nothing you say seriously. During my RFA you made a post on my talk page about how much you "respected me" and how wrong you were for misinterpreting my actions on the Homeopathy article as harmful, and then not 1 day later you (yet again) misinterpret my edits and actions and then attack me as being racist and strike out your comments about respecting me.

A problem with a lot of wikipedians is that they are so uneasy about the possibility of racism on Wikipedia they interpret people who make edits they disagree with as racist. Any edit that is even vaguely against the grain of what is expected when it comes to race is labeled racist, regardless of the intentions of the editor. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 20:45, 26 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Rollback

Hello Wikidudeman, I've granted rollback rights to your account. You would have received rollback had your RfA passed, but since it didn't, I thought I'd give it to you. For more information on rollback, see Wikipedia:New admin school/Rollback and Wikipedia:Rollback feature. If you don't want rollback, just let me know, and I'll remove it. Good luck. Acalamari 21:30, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I tested it out. I don't plan to fight vandalism anymore unless it appears on a page I am watching, but it might come in handy. Or it might not. Either way, thanks. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 02:28, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Signpost updated for January 21st, 2008.

The Wikipedia Signpost Weekly Delivery


Volume 4, Issue 4	21 January 2008	About the Signpost

Special: 2007 in Review, Part II	New parser preprocessor to be introduced
Commons Picture of the Year contest in final round	WikiWorld comic: "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo"
News and notes: Freely-licensed music, milestones	Wikipedia in the News
Features and admins	Bugs, Repairs, and Internal Operational News


Home \| Archives \| Newsroom \| Tip Line \| Single-Page View	Shortcut : WP:POST

You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 00:54, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

RFA

Wikidudeman, Thank you for your support in my RFA which passed 43/0/1. I would like to especially thank Bibliomaniac15 for being my nominator and admin coach. I would also like to thank Rudget for being my co-nominator. I'm sure that I can live up to the community's expectations as an administrator, and not totally mess everything up. Thanks again for your support! Malinaccier (talk) 17:30, 26 January 2008 (UTC) [reply]

Ouch :(--Filll (talk) 17:43, 26 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My RFA

		Thanks!
		[[User:Wikidudeman\|Wikidudeman]], thank you for showing your support in my RFA which passed with 38 support, 0 oppose, and 0 neutral! I also want to give special thanks to my Admin Coach and nominator, Useight for all of his help and support. I promise that I'll give my best effort as an admin, and I hope that your confidence in me proves to be justified. If I can ever be of any help, please let me know. In the mean time, I have some cleaning to do. Have a great day! Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 20:28, 26 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 121: / Line 121: @@
 This is what I was referring to above. I and many others were glad to support you until the David Irving talk page discussion was exposed. Then, for people to feel comfortable supporting you, they need an explanation, an apology, something. And they probably need enough time to be able to digest your apology or explanation. That is all. --[[User:Filll|Filll]] ([[User talk:Filll|talk]]) 18:34, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
+::Orangemarlin, You clearly have reading compression issues, so I won't fault you for that. However you should try to pay attention to what I am saying closely so that perhaps you can understand exactly why I did what I did. I was unsure about referring to David Irving as a "discredited historian" simply because I was unsure about whether or not someone could still be a "historian" even if most of what they said was discredited. That's it. You interpret that as antisemitism. You clearly don't have a clue what antisemitism is. If you want to attack people like myself who do things that you disagree with as antisemitic then you're just playing the race card and are a race baiter. Pure and simple.
+::The reason I used Stormfront.com as a source was not because I thought anything they said was reliable, it was because I was using it as a reference to support the fact that such people with such beliefs exist. That is it. It would be like using Mein Kampf as a source for a statement about Hitlers beliefs and then being attacked as a racist for using Mein Kampf as a source. The absurdity of that is beyond comprehension.
+::The problem isn't me, It's you and others like you who want to interpret something as benign as the edits I made as racist simply because you don't like them. You're right about one thing though, I don't care about what you think. I've had more than enough experience with you in the past to take nothing you say seriously. During my RFA you made a post on my talk page about how much you "respected me" and how wrong you were for misinterpreting my actions on the [[Homeopathy]] article as harmful, and then not 1 day later you (yet again) misinterpret my edits and actions and then attack me as being racist and strike out your comments about respecting me.
+::A problem with a lot of wikipedians is that they are so uneasy about the possibility of racism on Wikipedia they interpret people who make edits they disagree with as racist. Any edit that is even vaguely against the grain of what is expected when it comes to race is labeled racist, regardless of the intentions of the editor. [[User:Wikidudeman|'''<font color="green">Wikidudeman</font>''']] <sup>[[User talk:Wikidudeman|(talk)]]</sup> 20:45, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
 == Rollback ==