User talk:Floquenbeam

SEMI-RETIRED

This user is no longer very active on Wikipedia.

Folly, thou conquerest, and I must yield! Against stupidity the very gods Themselves contend in vain. --Friedrich Schiller

Sitting candidates

Regarding "why is being an ArbCom candidate reason to recuse?", I'd consider it legitimate grounds in this particular and unusual set of circumstances. Imagine Kevin finishes 9th and GW 10th, and GW then votes to take action against Kevin and he resigns in disgust, meaning she gets bumped up into the newly-vacant slot; it would cause a huge stink. Thus, it puts huge pressure on her not to support any sanctions against Kevin, as support from her for something potentially disqualifying him will look like corruption regardless of intent. (Pinging GorillaWarfare in case she wants to correct that, although I'm fairly certain my interpretation of her decision is correct.) ‑ Iridescent 10:37, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

As I've said on the arb page, my recusal was largely due to my forgetfulness that voting is over. I'm not terribly concerned about your hypothetical, which strikes me as fairly unlikely. If that kind of thing happened due to my support of a sanction against Kevin, people should certainly be supporting me, as that kind of precognition would be nearly supernatural. GorillaWarfare (talk) 11:18, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

I suppose that's a possible concern I hadn't thought of, Iri. Seems pretty unlikely in this case (and it would only work if Kevin actually voluntarily quit completely in response to being desysopped), but it is a theoretical concern. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:14, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

But ... there's no reason to believe that if hypothetically one of the top nine vote-getters were to withdraw or be disqualified or choose not to serve, the 10th vote-getter would be seated instead. That didn't happen when 28bytes chose not to take his seat, for example. Newyorkbrad (talk) 16:29, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

It would be up to the EC, but my guess would be if the withdrawal happened before the announcement of the results, they'd treat it like any other withdrawn candidate, and if it happened after, they'd probably treat it like they did when 28bytes chose not to take his seat. So that's another complicating theoretical point. Practically speaking, if Kevin is 9th and Molly is 10th, I'll eat my hat. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:34, 9 December 2015 (UTC)

Weirder things have happened, and this election is weirder than most; besides, if you don't think "theoretical marginal possibility of corruption" is enough to set the hounds barking, I'd suggest you watchlist Jimbo's talkpage. My prediction—as documented at length on OR's talkpage (no, not that OR, the other one) is that the inflated turnout will mean many more votes based on what the candidates say in their statements, and proportionately a lot less based on actual experience of seeing way the candidates really behave rather than how they claim to behave; consequently, I suspect some results which will seem really weird to those used to business as usual. I tip Kirill, Mark Bernstein, Keilana, Opabinia and Marensingha all to do better than would be expected by those familiar with them, as they're the ones who've done the best job of looking good on paper. ‑ Iridescent 00:15, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

Ah, three out of five. Only three of the winning nine whom I wouldn't have expected to have won in a normal year, although I'll admit to being totally wrong about Mahensingha. ‑ Iridescent 00:25, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

@Iridescent: et al.: My take on the election is that the results might well have been substantially the same in a "normal year" (i.e. with a fifth as many voters). All the speculation that the less active editor-voters would radically change the nature of the election seems in retrospect to have been wide of the mark (although it was a quite understandable concern, especially before Opabinia regalis posted her analysis). Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:43, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

I think what made the outcome more predictable (or less unusual) than we might have thought is the fact that you get Neutral served as default and need to do something to support or oppose, resulting in many neutrals which don't matter. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:38, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

I was very surprised when I finally got around to looking at the 'most recent edit' data, because spot-checks from myself and others seemed to indicate that we really were looking at a lot of voters with little recent engagement. Shows how big the gulf can be between anecdote and data! Incidentally, last year was on the low end for neutrals as a percentage of the total; historical average is ~40%, compared to this year's 50%. Opabinia regalis (talk) 21:34, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

N0n3up

Would you consider easing your 0RR rule to 1RR, for N0n3up? I don't want to see any editor getting booted off of Wikipedia, unless that editor's vandalizing, threatening or socking. GoodDay (talk) 03:08, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

@GoodDay: I would be against that change, although if other admins disagree and want to change it, I won't fight hard. My reasoning is:

• Helping N0n3up: I honestly believe it will be easier to follow 0RR than 1RR. 0RR is a way of saying: never do this. 1RR is a way of saying, do this but only a little. it seems to me that the best hope of success is to take reverting completely out of his toolbag. Sort of like "I won't drink" has more likelihood of success than "Well maybe just one..."
• Limiting further disruption: If he can't resist doing something when it is crystal clear than doing it will result in an infinite block, then he's not going to be able to edit here. If that's the case, let's get it over with, for his sake and ours.

--Floquenbeam (talk) 16:34, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Ok :) GoodDay (talk) 18:56, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Choice

How old are you Lmnodogsuphomie101 (talk) 21:06, 16 December 2015 (UTC)