Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Somno

Somno

Nomination

Voice your opinion (talk page) (78/3/3); Scheduled to end 11:32, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Somno (talk · contribs) – For some 16 months now, Somno has been quietly contributing both quality content and routine maintenance, amassing over 6000 useful edits with a minimum of fuss. I have had plenty of opportunities to observe her participation here, and am impressed by her good judgment and steady, helpful demeanour. Combine these with a solid understanding of policy and procedures, and we have the makings of a first-rate administrator.

Many of Somno's contributions are in areas like CSD and new pages patrol, where being challenged by the cranky and clueless comes with the territory. A look through her talk archives shows that she always replies to such challenges with a patient and polite explanation. Of course, these are also the areas where possession of the sysop tools can really boost productivity.

Here we have someone who has clearly demonstrated both a need for the sysop tools, and the wisdom and temperament to use them well. I think it is time we trusted her with a little more. Hesperian 11:02, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: Thanks, I accept the nomination. Somno (talk) 11:20, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

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: I would continue to patrol new pages, and I would be able to speedily delete articles myself rather than tag them for others. I could also action items in the deletion queue. This category does become backlogged, which doesn't matter so much for items tagged with A7 (doesn’t assert significance) or test pages, but can matter when items are tagged with G3 (vandalism) or G10 (attack pages). I would also like to action expired prods.

I'd also work at administrator intervention against vandalism. I used to be an active vandal fighter in my early days here, and obtained rollback in January 2008, shortly after it became available to non-administrators. Now, I mostly revert vandalism to articles on my watchlist, which explains why articles such as Baldwinsville, New York and Omarion top my most-edited list. It also explains why I rarely get past giving a level 1 warning these days, but there are plenty of examples of those in my contributions list. For an AIV-reported user, it is simply a matter of determining whether they are vandalising, whether they have been sufficiently warned, and whether they're still active, then acting – all of which I have the skills to do.

I believe in branching out slowly, so those are the two areas I plan to focus on first. In the future, I would like to close and action items at articles for deletion, and learn how to perform history merges and the like to help out in suspected copyright violations (fixing cut-and-paste moves) and requested moves.

2. What are your best contributions to Wikipedia, and why?

A: The single edit I am most proud of is this one, as it took quite a lot of time behind the scenes to complete! I have contributed to two Good Articles: Sindy and Aeroplane Jelly. There are also several works in progress, such as 2008 Western Australian gas crisis, which I hope will get to Featured Article status eventually, and most of the articles listed here under "New articles" and "Expanded".

A recent article I'm proud of is my rewrite of Ben Cousins, an Australian rules footballer that is constantly in the limelight for various "controversies". Like everyone else in Australia, I'm tired of hearing about him, but when I came across his article and it looked like this, I took it upon myself to rewrite it. This is an biography of a living person that had 12,000 hits last month, but was a shameful mess due to recentism, proseline and more importantly, neutrality problems, with nearly two-thirds of the article about newspaper gossip and little about his football career. I believe I've turned the article around to be more fair by greatly expanding the information on his career and integrating the controversies. In my humble opinion, if the article had a section about his playing style, it might be worthy of Good Article status. I think this shows my dedication to the project (spending hours rewriting the article of a former West Coast Eagle, despite being a supporter of their arch rival!) and understanding of Wikipedia's fundamental policies such as verifiability, neutral point of view and biographies of living persons.

Aside from contributing article content, I patrol new pages and, where appropriate, fix them or tag them for fixing or deletion. I have helped rid the encyclopedia of articles that do not belong, per the deletion policy, and rescued a few articles from articles for deletion (e.g. Road Island Diner, Womensforum, and to a lesser extent, Saraswathi Sabatham).

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: I tend to edit neglected articles, rather than contentious ones, so I haven't been in many editing conflicts. I have received some "Why did you delete my article?" questions in response to speedy deletion tags, but I've discussed these with the editors and they haven't turned into issues. Overall, I believe in discussion and compromise, which generally works well both on Wikipedia and in real life.

The only two situations I can think of that caused me stress were in February and July 2008, so it's been awhile. The July issue related to another user's ownership of Jimmy O'Connor (author) and seeming unwillingness to work collaboratively (discussions can be seen at the bottom of User talk:Somno/Archive 3 and at Talk:Jimmy O'Connor (author)). I didn't handle this as well as I could have; I was taken aback by the editor saying I was not allowed to edit the article because I didn't know the subject personally. I was just slow to realise that although Wikipedia's motto is "The free encyclopedia that anyone can edit", not everybody understands that anyone else can change their edit, and that it's an encyclopedia, not a personal webpage. I am now better at approaching such editors, both as a result of this experience and of continuing to patrol new pages.

The other issue was early in my days here, when I was harassed and impersonated by an IP editor. I found it very stressful at the time because I didn't understand why someone would target me personally – I had merely reverted vandalism on Cooper University Hospital. It's another experience I've learnt from, and I certainly don't take things on here to heart anymore.

Additional questions from SoWhy

4: You mentioned you like to work in deletion. Do you think there are reasons to delete pages without a five-day-period (PROD/AFD) even if they do not meet WP:CSD?

A: The criteria for speedy deletion are strict because with one person making the decision to delete, we need to make sure it's for a clear cut reason (i.e. objective and uncontestable). For a simple example, we don't want someone to speedily delete an article because they've never heard of the topic and assume it's non-notable or nonsense, when the opposite could be shown through AFD and the participation of more people.

Speedily deleting an article that doesn't meet speedy criteria would be an ignore all rules scenario. Often at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion, the "spirit" of criteria is discussed and that's an idea I agree with. For example, A7 is for deleting articles about a real person, organisation or web content that don't indicate that it's significant. In the spirit of this criterion, I would consider deleting articles about a character that was made up (I have seen articles created by kids that clearly state it's a character they've made up), a pet cat (that didn't assert it was notable for a reasonable reason) and the like. These are not examples that come up often, hence they're not included in the criteria, but I believe they meet the spirit of A7.

In most cases though, if an article isn't an attack page or vandalism, I don't see any problem with waiting five days for a prod tag to expire or an AFD to finish. There's no hurry and it's better to be sure than to delete an article worth keeping that has to go through deletion review, be recreated, or worst of all, we just never get it back.

Additional questions from Cam

5: If they were to conflict with one another in an admin-related decision, would you place greater emphasis on Wikipedia's Policy or on Common Sense?

A: Well, obviously I'd hope that policies and common sense agreed and there were never any conflicts between the two, but I'm realistic. It depends on the policy and situation, so I can't give a blanket answer. If a logical argument could be made that "Despite policy X, doing Y would be a good idea", then in theory, I'd be open to it, but I'm generally one who accepts policies and works within them. They are primarily built by consensus, so who am I to go against consensus? (If I did have an ongoing problem with a policy, I'd bring it up on its talk page or at the village pump to try to change consensus.)

The trouble with using common sense is that common sense to me might not be common sense to you, others, newbies, the Foundation, etc and vice versa. For example, non-free content comes up everywhere in the encyclopedia. Sure, it's a guideline, not a policy, and it tells editors they can use "common sense and the occasional exception", so really if everyone uses common sense, there should be no arguments... except of course, it's the exact opposite. It may be common sense to someone to use an image of a TV character to illustrate a biography of a living person, except that someone else will remove it because it doesn't meet NFCC #1 (and if it's a B&B actor or actress, the remover will probably be me because I have those articles watchlisted from previous experience!). It might be common sense to some to give all theories equal weight, but anyone who's ever seen an argument about fringe theories knows that will be unsuccessful and incorrect.

Basically, I read every policy and guideline I could before making my first big edits and creating my first article. I was really pedantic about it; probably the exact opposite of 85%* of newbies I come across while new page patrolling. As I became more familiar with Wikipedia, I realised I don't need to be so pedantic all of the time. I respect the policies and guidelines of the community (even the sometimes-maligned MOS) and abide by them wherever I can. The key point, I suppose, is "wherever I can". My aim here is to improve the information in the encyclopedia, and I will continue to do whatever I can to keep on doing that. If slightly bending a rule with good reason helps me do that, I'll do it. If following a policy to the letter helps me do that, then that's what I'll do. I believe I've successfully balanced this as an editor, so I don't see why it'd be different if I were an admin.

The TL;DR version of the above answer is: it depends; usually the policies.

* Note: actual percentage of newbies may vary. :)

Q's from flaminglawyer

6. In your own words, no copy-pasting: What's the difference between a block and a ban? Also, give a real-life analogy between the two.

A. Blocks physically stop accounts or IPs from editing the encyclopedia. Blocked users usually can't edit anything except their talk page to post unblock requests, explanations etc., although if used disruptively, it's likely to be disabled. Based on the block options, they may or may not be able to email other users (if it's an account) or create another account. We block people to protect the encyclopedia, Foundation and editors from vandalism, copyvio, violating BLP, personal attacks, spam, legal threats etc etc (I'm on my lunch break at the moment, so I'm not going to list every reason!). Usually users receive warnings that increase in severity to a "final warning"; exceptions may occur when it's an obvious sockpuppet, pagemove vandal or so on and/or immediate action is necessary.

Bans are decided by Arbcom, dispute resolution, ANI, Jimbo, and are basically a way of saying, "Look, we've done all we can but you're disrupting the project too much and (based on evidence) you're not willing or able to change". Users can be topic-banned, namespace-banned, or banned from editing altogether, depending on the issue.

Post-lunch break, the analogy I've come up with is that a block is like a police officer impounding a driver's car. There is usually nothing to stop the person from driving another car (i.e. creating another account) and going back out on the road (editing again), provided they follow the road rules. They may also be able to get their car out of the impound lot after a set period of time or an apology and drive it again. A site ban is like the courts taking away someone's drivers' licence, telling them that they're not allowed to drive and subsequently impounding every car they use if they break the ban.

Some users below have asked whether I am condoning block evasion in the answer above. Of course not; I'm simply referring to the fact that it does happen. Say an account is blocked indefinitely as a vandalism-only account (usually account creation is also blocked). A month goes by and the person decides they want to rejoin Wikipedia and contribute constructively. If they create an account on another computer and contribute constructively, we're not going to connect them to their previous account through behaviour or run a checkuser, so they're able to edit again. I'm not saying that this is a good thing, I'm simply stating a fact. Compare this to someone being blocked for edit warring, creating another account and returning to the same article to edit war, where we'd rightly be suspicious.

7. Under what circumstances would you delete an article whose AfD had over 70% keep, and vice-versa?

A. AFD is not a vote and not judged on percentages alone, but judged on the strength of the arguments and validity of the votes. For example, keep arguments consisting of "I like this article" would not carry as much weight as deletion arguments of "This article violates policies X, Y, Z because of A, B, C". Vote-stacking such as sockpuppetry and meatpuppetry would also play a role in discounting !votes in the final count.

This close would be controversial because 70% of !voters disagree with the call, and they mightn't understand the logic of a majority voting for one thing and the opposite being done. It would need a good closing rationale and the ability to defend the decision if/when questioned.

Optional question from Hipocrite

8. Have you been involved in a long running dispute as a neutral third party? How did you address it? If not, could you please pick a current long running dispute and discuss how you might help address it?

A. No, I haven't, either as a neutral or involved party. Dispute resolution in all its forms is important to the encyclopedia but is not an area where I have a strong interest. I'm happy to give an opinion if asked or if I come across a dispute and believe I could help, but it's not something I actively seek out. I do a lot of mediation in real life but I edit here as a hobby. (A sometimes all-encompassing hobby, but a hobby nonetheless.)

Although familiar with many long-term disputes on Wikipedia, I haven't followed any closely enough to answer this question to my satisfaction without spending a lot of time reading up on a dispute. That is time I could use to improve the encyclopedia, rather than to answer an RFA question, so I am choosing not to answer the third part of your question. I hope you don't mind, and please understand that if I was involved in a dispute as a neutral third party, I would spend as much time on it as required.

General comments

• Links for Somno: Somno (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)

---

Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review Special:Contributions/Somno before commenting.

Discussion

Support

1. (Nominator) Hesperian 11:04, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
2. Support Looks good. Epbr123 (talk) 11:53, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
3. Support Good contributor, clean block log, civil talk and user pages, and I'm very reassured by this WereSpielChequers 11:59, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
4. Support a review of your last 500 contributions turns up nothing bad, lots of good work in the article space, excellent edit summary usage, need for the tools, good nomination. Also per my RfA criteria Foxy Loxy ^Pounce! 12:32, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
5. Support - Quick review of recent contributions turns up nothing worrying, and the review by Balloonman is reassuring. — neuro^(talk) 12:57, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
6. Support Good luck. Nick mallory (talk) 13:15, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
7. --Mojska (m) 13:15, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
8. Support Really liked the answer to #1 so you've got my vote.--Iamawesome800 Talk to Me 14:06, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
9. An outstanding candidate. Maneur (talk) 14:08, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
10. Support - having interacted with this editor since her starting I have been impressed by the level-headedness in dealing with issues - I also have noticed a thoroughness and attention to detail, and knowing the range of contributions to WP Australia and Western Australia - I would consider adminship to be a further step in a positive presence on wikipedia SatuSuro 14:17, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
11. I interacted with Somno while (s)he worked on Sindy (and, I'm sure, in other places) and know I can trust them based on the good work done there. Giggy (talk) 14:26, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
12. absolute, a level headed contributor like all the people Hesperian suggests for RfA. Gnangarra 14:35, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
13. One of the most impressive RfA's I've seen in terms of answers to questions. I'd be delighted to see you with the tools. —Cyclonenim (talk · contribs · email) 15:13, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
14. Support - Very persuasive nomination and I liked the maturity displayed in the answers to the questions. --NrDg 16:45, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
15. Support User has been around since October 2007 and after looking at contributions feel giving the user tools will only help the project.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 17:22, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
16. Support. A very good candidate with a good nomination and excellent answers. I see there being no potential problems if Somno had the tools. Rje (talk) 17:45, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
17. Strong Support, very impressive candidate. Terraxos (talk) 19:13, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
18. Support as candidate meets User:A_Nobody#RfA_Standards by having not been blocked, having received a couple barnstars, and due to no negative interactions in AfDs. Best, --A Nobody^{My talk} 19:34, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
19. Support. —_macy^{es: bot} 21:00, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
20. Strong candidate. ~EDDY ^{(talk/contribs/editor review)}~ 21:22, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
21. Support - I don't foresee any problems/issues. Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 21:58, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
22. Strong Support - This is one candidate I can trust the mop with. In going over her contributions, I see no issues. ArcAngel (talk) 22:28, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
23. Your answers look very good. Best of luck, Malinaccier (talk) 22:54, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
24. NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 23:10, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
25. Support Looks fine to me. LittleMountain5 23:15, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
26. Support A review of this users deleted contributions shows that s/he is a quick learner. The first deleted edit reversed an author blanking a page (in order to re-insert an A7 tag), not really a practice that we like to see. Later edits did not show this pattern. An informative edit summary was used each time (even prior to the candidate installing some tools which automated the csd edit summary), as the policy demands. there is a selection bias involved in checking deleted articles for proper speedy tagging, but keeping that in mind the overwhelming majority of the tags were appropriate. Likewise their nose for AfD nominations is dead-on. The only one that looked out of whack was Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Diary of a Teenage Girl, where the candidate did the right thing: withdrew the nomination when contrary information surfaced. I can support this user. Protonk (talk) 00:17, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
27. Patton^t/c 00:18, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
28. Strong support A great all-round candidate who will make a superb administrator. Good luck! -- Mattinbgn\^talk 01:22, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
29. Switching from oppose Support per my RfA Criteria. K50 Dude ROCKS! 03:00, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
30. Support per nom. Melburnian (talk) 03:20, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
31. Strong support YellowMonkey (click here to vote for world cycling's #1 model!) 04:27, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
32. Support. Rare patience in handling newbies (i.e. User_talk:Rcsadeh#Moving pages); human (humane?) explanations appending userpage templates, etc. signs of a good citizen. Uneventful and apparently safe deletion record, leaning to PRODs; hope you won't switch to shoot-first CSDs. NVO (talk) 04:44, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
33. Strong support. Wizardman 06:54, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
34. Support No problems here. A good editor! Siva1979^{Talk to me} 08:28, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
35. Support - Garion96 (talk) 09:21, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
36. Support per above. Graham87 09:28, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
37. Sure.  GARDEN  10:28, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
38. Support Like, duh. FlyingToaster 11:49, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
39. Answers to questions show a level-headed candidate; I trust her to not jump into an area with the tools where she is not yet comfortable, if there are any such areas. Happy to support here. GlassCobra 15:15, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
40. Support per above fine arguments. Dlohcierekim 16:39, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
41. Support Tim Q. Wells (talk) 17:37, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
42. Support No reason not to trust him. rootology (C)(T) 18:22, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
43. Support Fit for the job ♣PrincessClown♥ 20:39, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
44. Support I see the user is sensible and has good intentions, is patient and friendly. One advice though: I'm still not fully satisfied by the answer to Q4. You need to be very careful with IAR and deletion because (imho) the reason WP:CSD was created was to limit the cases in which admins may delete pages; this means that if CSD does not fit, you should not delete. I understand it for pets and A7 for example, but with fictional characters you can easily incur the anger of other editors. After all, waiting for 5 days does not hurt us. But I think you will do fine :-) SoWhy 21:00, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

    I agree, but thought I should be honest that sometimes IAR is invoked in CSD, and I may do that occasionally. Certainly not at first, and certainly not often! I really liked your question, BTW; one of the best I've seen at RFA in awhile and I'm glad it was asked of me. Somno (talk) 23:15, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

    Yes, it is done (quite often by some I'm afraid), that's why I asked. I am quite strict in that matter, so I would not want to support anyone who would IAR their way through deletion. I advise you to do the same, because waiting does not hurt anyone (except in cases of G10 and G12 but those are covered). I am glad you liked the question. I'd be happy to assist you with deletion- and admin-related questions if this request is successful (which it looks like and which I hope). Regards SoWhy 10:17, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

45. Support, good and level-headed contributor. rspεεr (talk) 21:29, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
46. Support. Trustworthy and sensible editor. Jonathan321 (talk) 22:21, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
47. Support, no reason to believe this user would abuse the tools. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 22:48, 1 February 2009 (UTC).
48. Support. No problems here. Pastor Theo (talk) 23:32, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
49. Support. Erik9 (talk) 01:08, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
50. Support. Looks like a good candidate with nothing that throws up any red flags for me. The answer to Q4 is icing on the cake. Trusilver 03:15, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
51. Support - Seems good. Xclamation point 05:13, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
52. Support: Conscientious editor. Good candidate. Sunray (talk) 06:15, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
53. Support, good new page patrol as far as I checked. The answer to Q4 is also good; anybody who always follows the letter of a policy isn't going to be a good admin. Kusma (talk) 13:56, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
54. DAMN IT!!! I was actually looking over Somno a week or so ago and was going to nominate him myself. He came to me a few weeks ago for a CSD review, to which I gave him the following review. He does a GREAT job with CSD and his interpersonal skills are excellent as well. 100% support from me... and yes, this does break my tradition of not supporting shoe in candidates, but I feel that strongly about Somno, that I have to support!---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloon 14:23, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
    • She. Hesperian 01:26, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
55. Support - per Protonk and the guy right above me, though Balloonboy should calm down... ;) —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 15:30, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

    huh???---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloon 15:37, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

56. Support. Good contributions. A fine candidate. Axl ¤ [Talk] 19:50, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
57. Support Per nom statement. America69 (talk) 19:51, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
58. Support - meets my standards and raises no concerns. Bearian (talk) 21:40, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
59. Support Looks good to me. --Chasingsol^(talk) 22:26, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
60. Support Nothing done by this user makes me want to oppose him at this point in time. Cheers, Razorflame 00:03, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
61. Support Awesome user. Tcrow777 ^Talk 05:27, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
62. Support — Would make a fine administrator. — RyanCross (talk) 06:56, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
63. Support A good candidate - no problems at all. --Anthony.bradbury^"talk" 11:17, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
64. Support, unequivocal. cygnis insignis 12:36, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
65. Strong Support - impressive! --David Shankbone 16:55, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
66. Support - User isn't going to break the wiki because they only have X number of project space edits. :) –Juliancolton ^{Tropical Cyclone} 17:40, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
67. Support Aw schizz. The answers to my Q's (6 and 7) are amazing. You've got my vote. flaminglawyer 19:31, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
68. Support Ray (talk) 21:24, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
69. Support Sumoeagle179 (talk) 21:34, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
70. Support — JoJo • Talk • 21:52, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
71. Support Sounds like a good candidate from the description. NanohaA'sYuri^{Talk, My master} 01:24, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
72. Support per all of above. Spinach Monster (talk) 01:50, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
73. I'm Mailer Diablo and I approve this message! - 04:42, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
74. Support --Baiji (talk) 15:49, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
75. Support, excellent contributor that definitely appears sensible and mature. Sounds like good admin material to me! ~ mazca ^t|c 18:28, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
76. Support. Jonathunder (talk) 18:34, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
77. Support. Willking1979 (talk) 18:38, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
78. Holy shit - We have users who aren't complete policy wonks and are able to pass RFA now?! Mr.Z-man 18:48, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
79. Support – will do fine with the tools. TheAE talk/sign 23:56, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
80. Support. Fully qualified candidate. I have considered the opposers' and neutrals' concerns and find them unpersuasive. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:09, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
81. Support looks excellent. Impressive contributions to the encyclopedia. Fantastic answers to the questions. I would be happy to have her as an administrator here -- Samir 02:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
82. Support: She welcome newbies nicely^^--JN 09:29, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Oppose, low level of Wikipedia-namespace edits indicates a likely lack of policy knowledge. Stifle (talk) 17:35, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

   Are you kidding? Look at the answers to the questions, hell, ask more if you like. This user seems very well endowed with policy knowledge. Assuming that the candidate "likely" lacks policy knowledge isn't good enough IMHO, why not try and investigate to find out for yourself? —Cyclonenim (talk · contribs · email) 18:30, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

   → Extended discussion moved to talk page. Regards SoWhy 11:29, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Weak Oppose (See RfA Criteria). I looked thru your contributions and they didn't tie into the part in Question 1 where you mentioned the speedy deletion que. In the last month (where you probably had 500 edits) you worked more with notifications of Speedy Deletions, not actually working with them and tagging. The one item you did tag here was not spam and you tagged it as if it was. According to WP:CSD#G11 "...pages that exclusively promote some entity and that would need to be fundamentally rewritten to become encyclopedic..." The page at the time didn't have to be rewriteen. I do appreciate your vandalism work so I'm not going to give you a full oppose but I will have to do a weak one. K50 Dude ROCKS! 19:23, 31 January 2009 (UTC) Switched to support. K50 Dude ROCKS! 02:59, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Hi K50 Dude, I hope you don't mind but I'd just like to understand your oppose a little better. Do you mean that in my contributions, all you see are several talk page messages like "Notification: Speedy deletion nomination of Thomas Hoeren.", but you don't see that I tagged Thomas Hoeren? That's because the page was deleted after I tagged it, so it no longer shows up in the list of contributions. Or, do you mean that I nominate more new articles for speedy deletion than I fix? That's true, simply because I think getting rid of those articles is more of a priority than fixing articles that are essentially OK. Somno (talk) 02:17, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Good point. Thanks for letting me know. Sorry about that \= K50 Dude ROCKS! 02:59, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

2. Strong Oppose - the desire to work New Page Patrol with only 500 edits in Wikipedia mainspace? Okay, now I can put my thumb on it. If you want to work the area, why aren't you working the area? There is a lot of stuff non-admin can do, and you can easily get over 100 edits in a day from new page patrol just from reverting vandalism, fixing nonsense, tagging things, etc. Lack of experience in the area, lack of familiarity, etc. If you want to do the administrative side, then you should really be showing up on the pages related to NPP administrative action - deletions, page protections, vandalism, etc. Ottava Rima (talk) 00:18, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Aside from AIV, what does WP-space edit count have to do with new page patrol? Protonk (talk) 00:41, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   I'm confused by the reasoning too - NPP is related to Wikignomish activity and CSD tagging - which the candidate has done plenty of. Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 00:43, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   So, are you two saying that a non-admin going through new pages doesn't use vandalism? page protection? ANI or AN? AfD? or anything else related? Because when I went through NPP, I could only do a few at a time because I would get bogged down on those. That is why I only perform NPP when there is a backlog and lots of complaining about no one doing it. NPP requires follow through. If he wants the tools to work NPP and yet doesn't go through the process that would normally have admin involved on the pages, then whats the point of giving him the tools? So he can avoid the processes all together? That doesn't seem right especially with lack of experience in the background areas. Ottava Rima (talk) 03:07, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Sure. why would they use RFPP? Why would they use AN/I and AN? S/he seems to use the csd tags a fair bit on new pages. I can see the point about AIV, but lack of edits to AIV doesn't mean that vandalism wasn't reverted. I think I was on wiki for 2-3 months before I figured out AIV existed. Protonk (talk) 03:44, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   I have never needed to use ANI/AN as a result of new page patrolling, but I do end up taking things to AFD from it (which wouldn't change if I became an admin). I can't think of any examples where I've needed to report someone to AIV based on NPP; if a user is creating attack pages or vandalism pages, they are generally blocked before I need to report them (usually by a deleting admin). I have taken a couple of pages to RFPP for recreation protection, but again, this generally seems to be done by the deleting admin so it doesn't come up often for me. Somno (talk) 04:00, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   To be frank for a moment, this oppose just isn't making a whole lot of sense to me. NPP rarely results in reports to AIV, RFPP or ANI. I honestly can't believe ANI was even mentioned in an RfA where the candidate appears to be a sound CSDer. Wisdom89 _{(T / ^C)} 04:22, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   I find it odd why someone would ask me why they would use ANI when it is blatantly obvious - you patrol new pages, you find problems. You find vandalism. You find SOAP issues. You find other problems. If you don't go to AN, ANI, AfD, page protection, vandalism, etc, then you aren't doing a thorough job at NPP. When I perform NPP, I always end up in those areas. I list articles for deletion. I report vandalism. I report soap. Etc. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:12, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Ottava, this is such a crappy excuse for an oppose, and a strong oppose at that. Really poor form on your part. --David Shankbone 04:33, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

3. Oppose per answer to Q4 - CSD is to be executed via the "spirit" of the guidelines? Scary. Townlake (talk) 21:15, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   I expect at least one opppose from that answer, but I should point out that I meant very, very rarely should it be used in the "spirit"; normally to the letter. As I said, the criteria are very strict for a reason. :) Somno (talk) 23:15, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

   Actually I like the answer to the question. I'm rather sick of mush-brained administrators and pre-administrator sycophants that are unable to think for themselves and spend all their time hand-wringing over the bureaucratic minutia of policy rather than using common sense. Trusilver 03:14, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

   CSD has specific parameters for what's allowed to be speedily deleted because deferring to "common sense" would permit all kinds of bad CSDs, which already happen too frequently. Townlake (talk) 03:53, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

   @Somno - I appreciate the reply, and I imagine you'll be responsible given the trust you've otherwise built in the community. That said, I work on a lot more obscure stuff than high-profile stuff, so your comment just dinged a pet concern of mine. Just please do be mindful of the rules when this passes, for the sake of my own peace of mind! Townlake (talk) 03:57, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

   Thanks Townlake. Don't worry, I won't be deleting all sorts of articles using "IAR" as the reason. I'm quite a conservative speedy tagger (prefer to PROD or AFD if borderline, prefer to give A7 articles a chance, and prefer to get rid of obvious crap immediately), so I imagine I'd still be conservative if a speedy deleter. Please note that I'm not trying to convince you to change your !vote here; just explaining things further! :) Somno (talk) 04:15, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

   Common sense is something thats mistreated and under rated, having cookie cutter answers to questions doesnt show any understanding of the deletion processes. Admins need to make commons sense decisions with CSD where many of the articles get hangon tags or comments by inexperienced users, being able to save an erronously tagged article is as important as removing the neighbours cat articles. Gnangarra 10:40, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

   Side note: Could you please clarify your analogy in Q6? Your answer makes it sound like block evasion is wholly acceptable as long as no other rules are broken. I don't want to get overly pedantic about it, but is that what you meant? Townlake (talk) 18:55, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Neutral

Neutral - there seems to be something missing but I can't put my finger on it. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:19, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

1. Neutral-I'm just not convinced that this user should have the tools, nor am I that they should not.-Kieran4 (talk) 23:17, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
2. Neutral - I have an unusual feeling that candidate is not ready for the full weight of the position. Adminship is not easy and should not be take lightly. EtonLibrarian (talk) 20:19, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

   Actually, adminship (according to some) should be considered no big deal. This is a ridiculous way to think of adminship, because it is a big deal, but it's not big enough to not support a candidate because "he's not ready" when he obviously is (as is demonstrated by his contribs). flaminglawyer 05:42, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

3. Neutral I am neutral for now but could change to support. I have a number of concerns, some which are difficult to discuss. One easier one to discuss is that in question 6, Somno seems to be advocating breaking WP rules. Isn't creating a new account evading a block and not permitted. Or is he advocating that the ends justify the means (good editing takes priority so if you are blocked wrongly or rightly, you can try to evade the block)? If Somno discusses his response, maybe he meant something else (but part of being an admin is communicating well).Ipromise (talk) 06:44, 4 February 2009 (UTC)