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    The Bureaucrats' noticeboard is a place where items related to the Bureaucrats can be discussed and coordinated. Any user is welcome to leave a message or join the discussion here. Please start a new section for each topic.

    This is not a forum for grievances. It is a specific noticeboard addressing Bureaucrat-related issues. If you want to know more about an action by a particular bureaucrat, you should first raise the matter with them on their talk page. Please stay on topic, remain civil, and remember to assume good faith. Take extraneous comments or threads to relevant talk pages.

    If you are here to report that an RFA or an RFB is "overdue" or "expired", please wait at least 12 hours from the scheduled end time before making a post here about it. There are a fair number of active bureaucrats; and an eye is being kept on the time remaining on these discussions. Thank you for your patience.

    To request that your administrator status be removed, initiate a new section below.

    Crat tasks
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    RfA candidate S O N S % Status Ending (UTC) Time left Dups? Report
    Significa liberdade 44 0 0 100 Open 22:18, 21 September 2024 6 days, 16 hours no report
    It is 06:11:56 on September 15, 2024, according to the server's time and date.


    another inactivity issue

    I have a question, and depending on the answer possibly several more questions.

    When an admin receives a notice that they are going to be suspended for inactivity, the notice says they will be suspended if they do not return to activity within one month. I have always taken this to mean making an edit or other logged action on-wiki. Is there any cicrcumstance in which some other form of activity would be considered sufficient, as in an email to a 'crat or other off-wiki contact? Beeblebrox (talk) 21:34, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    An exception would be made if they're editing with an alternate account (e.g. WP:USEIGHT) but I don't believe that applies to the case you're referring to. I would think that if they emailed it would need to be noted on-wiki someplace by whomever they emailed, otherwise the inactivity procedures should automatically kick in. We no longer have a 'crat mailing list. 28bytes (talk) 22:22, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Right. And since you do know who I'm talking about, I can't tell why they are still an admin. They got the notice last year and did nothing that I can see for the next 6 months. I guess we might as well make it clear that the subject of discussion here is Revolving Bugbear (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA). Just an error maybe? (complicating matters, they have in the meantime made 3 edits and deleted some stuff in their userspace) Beeblebrox (talk) 22:40, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Wait, no I missed something, they also deleted something in their userspace just before they would've been desysopped. Blatant gaming but not a 'crat issue, never mind. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:41, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Yea, they clearly have a logged action this year - I would not revoke them. I think its a bad standard personally, but that's just opinion. — xaosflux Talk 22:45, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    For the benefit of those without access to admin x-ray specs, they deleted a blank page in their userspace. ‑ Iridescent 22:46, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    (edit conflict) Some notes: As the person who normally pulls these, I'd pretty much still pull if there were no edits or logged actions, I think the "alt account" thing is just wrong but I'm in the minority there. Some people argue that even an oversighted action or log should suffice, though I'd make someone from OS come defend them. I don't think I'd want to count "edit blocked" "actions" either (like a denied filter hit). This protected for life thing is what makes adminship more of a BIGDEAL than it should be. — xaosflux Talk 22:44, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    (edit conflict)That last point is a good thing to consider re: what to count for any proposed increase in activity standards, in particular how that proposal would be written. An attempted action that was blocked by a filter is clearly a sign the account shows at a mere modicum of activity, but is clearly neither the letter nor spirit of the policy put into place. The RfC was written specifically enough to not just be "inactivity,", but it's something to consider for a any future discussions. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 22:59, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Xaosflux makes a good point here; it would probably be useful to have a widely advertised discussion about whether the "one edit" requirement is intended by the community to simply solicit a "yep, still alive" message or a genuine indication that the inactive admin intends to return to active editing and adminning in a reasonably short period of time. It's only gaming if the community expects the latter. 28bytes (talk) 22:53, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    This is the third time they've almost been desyopped for inactivity, I don't think this is what the community expected when crafting the policy, which s a little too AGF-y in my opinion, but it was probably necessary to include all these loopholes just to have sucha policy in the first place. The latest discussion at WP:VPP seems to have fizzled out. I may consider drafting something but I've tried to keep clear of giant policy RFCs lately. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:01, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I left a message on Revolving Bugbear's talk page, and emailed them. I think discussion is the best first step in these cases. UninvitedCompany 23:13, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I am increasingly of the opinion that the notifications are a major flaw in this policy. It's been around for seven yers now, if you're aren't aware of the requirements by now then you probably shouldn't be an admin anyway. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:23, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Why? What do we accomplish by trying to surprise people? UninvitedCompany 23:44, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    A couple of points, for what it's worth.

    For a long time I held open in my mind the idea that I might return to Wikipedia. It was very much a thing I wanted to hold on to, because even though my life changed and I lost interest in admin'ing on a regular basis, it was a thing I had previously taken great joy in. But, ironically, every time this conversation comes up (and I do monitor it when I notice it), and every time I get one of these notices, it makes me want to come back less. Because there is an extent to which this bureaucracy is self-perpetuating and all of these edits spent discussing me could be better spent improving the encyclopedia, sure, but beyond that it isn't about me but about general approaches to policy. The last round of userspace cleanup was for actually personal reasons, and not to hit the token edit, and the notice kind of reminded me to do it. But for as long as I've been on Wikipedia (which is a very, very long time in Wikipedia years), there has been a tension about whether Wikipedia wants to be a place guided by rules, or a place guided by principles.

    28bytes has a very important point about the point of the one edit rule. I doubt that issue will ever be resolved, but it's a thing worth thinking about. If Wikipedia wants to have systems for taking the tools away from people who aren't using them, I don't have a philosophical objection to that, but it raises an extremely important practical question about whether the bureaucracy creates more work than the marginal value of removing the tools from someone who might make mistakes when they come back after a long hiatus. At least in my time active on Wikipedia, that subject was never really a decided issue. But it seems to me that it's kind of a critical question in addressing why the one-edit rule exists, and what the purpose of desysopping someone for inactivity is. And, for that matter, what the purpose of a conversation like this is.

    I'm more than a bit saddened at the use of the phrase "a little too AGF-y". I'm hoping (dare I say assuming?) that you didn't quite mean that the way it read.

    In any case, I don't really have a vested interest in my adminship at this point, so if it makes all your lives easier, yes, sure, go ahead and remove it. Many thanks to Uninvited Company for his kind words on and off the encyclopedia, and I am sorry to have wasted everyone's time. But it seems that there is a much bigger conversation to be had here which, to be frank, is part of the reason I stopped editing so long ago.

    Best wishes to all, and maybe I'll see you around here again some day. - Revolving Bugbear 00:29, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

     Done I have removed your bit pursuant to your request. I would like to once again thank you for your service to the project during its particularly critical formative and growth years, for the consistent high quality of your article contributions, and your level-headed involvement in WP:RFA. If you change your mind at some future point and rejoin the project, it would be my privilege to sponser a future RFA when the time is right and if you wish it. Meanwhile, be well, and thanks again. UninvitedCompany 01:01, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Just to respond to your question above.... it's kind of a "have you stopped beating your wife" question as it assumes a purpose that is not in evidence. Nobody is "trying to surprise people." There are two reasons behind the inactivity policy.
    One is simple security. Inactive or barely active users have on more than one occasion been the target of breaches, so the purely procedural removal of the tools after a solid year of no activity is a simple but effective precaution against this, and the two-year window where all they have to do is ask and the tools are returned helps unsure we aren't removing people who just took a year off but remain committed to the project.
    The reason for the lengthy inactivity and five-year clauses is to insure we don't have clueless admins who are completely out of touch with the expected current standards barging around and using advanced permissions in an unaccaptable manner, and it is not purely hypothetical. The five year clause seems to effect an average of one or two admins each month, and generally these are folks who stopped doing admin work a long time ago and do not need the tools even if they do return later.
    It is an observable trend that in some cases the notification triggers the admin in question to make one or two edits, insuring the user keeps the tools, but they otherwise do not engage. This defeats the purpose of both the above outlined reasons. And again, nobody should be terribly surprised anyway at this point as it is now a long-standing policy. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:14, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    @User:Beeblebrox, sorry I didn't reply earlier. Inactive admins were all once valuable, active, trusted contributors who worked hard on behalf of the project. I believe it is important that we part ways with them on the best possible terms. This is both for humanistic reasons -- I personally appreciate what they have done and would want them to look back on their experience here with warmth and joy -- and for project ones. They may return. They may speak to the press, or friends, or powerful people in industry or government, or schools deciding on whether to overturn their all-too-pervasive anti-Wikipedia policies. We should therefore treat them with the utmost respect. That requires clear communication of our policy and our intent before taking action. Regardless of what our purpose may be in revoking access without prior notification, it will have the effect of surprise. I don't think we want to do that. As for the people who are making token edits, I agree there is a problem, and as noted in the other sections of this page I am working to address it on a case-by-case basis and would be happy for others to help. UninvitedCompany 17:38, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    One question I have for you, UninvitedCompany, about your comments to Revolving Bugbear. You said If you change your mind at some future point and rejoin the project, it would be my privilege to sponser a future RFA when the time is right and if you wish it but as I understand it, Revolving Bugbear voluntarily relinquished his tools here and wasn't under a cloud. He could request them back over the next two years and they should be returned to him without a future RfA. Liz Read! Talk! 00:48, 14 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Hi Liz. Thanks for the note. Revolving Bugbear would technically qualify for the return of the tools at this point. Nonetheless, he has made no administrative actions since 2009 other than the deletion of two pages in his own userspace. Whether, after discussion amongst bureaucrats and the community, the tools would in fact be returned upon request is difficult to anticipate. I would also be willing to sponsor him at RFA after the passage of additional years, under the conditions noted. UninvitedCompany 04:28, 14 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I have mixed feelings reading over this discussion. I have had months-long periods of no activity. My activity had been declining for several years, until I had just 15 edits in all of last year. I've gone months without making an edit. I'm sure I've had longer gaps in using the admin buttons. Yet, here I am, fairly active again. If I lost the buttons, I probably wouldn't bother asking to get them back. I'm here (when I'm here) primarily to edit, admining is a sideline. If I'm no longer an admin, I'm sure others will cover what I do, as they have before, but that does raise the average workload, however slightly. Anyway, keep in mind that admins that have become inactive may just return someday. - Donald Albury 21:49, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Dealing with low-activity administrators through discussion

    Rather than set ever-higher minimum activity standards, I believe we should think critically about what we are trying to accomplish with desysops for inactivity, and deal with this through discussion and consensus with the affected individuals rather than trying to come up with a mechnical means of deciding who gets to keep their bit. Let's start with the real-world reasons for the housekeeping of what we call "inactive" users, and with the problems posed by overdoing it:

    • Accounts of people who have left the project completely are particularly susceptible to compromise because the account owner is not present to meet evolving security standards (password uniquiness, 2fa) and is not here to notice a "silent compromise." (This was the main rationale for the original policy).
    • There is perhaps a greater likelihood of someone who no longer has strong ties to the project transfering their dormant admin account to another person, in return for money or other personal gain.
    • On the other hand, people returning to Wikipedia after a long absence may face unique barriers at WP:RFA, because friends come and go but enemies accumulate over time.

    Now, the problem of people making rash administrative actions because they're out of touch with the project has so far been a hypothetical one. Our more serious administrator conduct problems have involved some long-time contributors who have never really left, and some relatively newly minted admins where, with 20/20 hindsight, we can see that adminship was never really right for them. I would challenge anyone who believes returning admins are a problem to identify a case that is an example of this.

    I really do believe that the oddball corner cases used as examples are outliers. I believe that the best way to handle them is for someone to contact the individual affected, just as I have done with Revolving Bugbear, and encourage them to re-engage or resign as they see fit. Ideally the person doing the asking would be someone who they interacted with in the past. The best outcome would be to get people to rethink the role of Wikipedia in their lives -- and the difference that they could make here -- and return. The message left should reflect that. Now, if we do that, and we look back a year later and see that they haven't resigned, and haven't re-engaged meaningfully, and still won't resign when asked, we can address it. I will be surprised if it happens.

    UninvitedCompany 23:44, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I will add that if anyone is keeping a list of admins who have been marginally attached for a very long time but who are gaming the system, I'll volunteer to contact the ones I know. UninvitedCompany 23:47, 5 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    @UninvitedCompany: Below is a list of admins whose last 20 edits go back to 2012. I am not accusing any of them of gaming the system, or indeed of doing anything wrong at all, just noting that they are not very active at the moment, if you want to reach out and engage with them. 28bytes (talk) 00:43, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    And here is a list of admins whose last 100 edits go back to 2009. As above, there's no suggestion that they're doing anything wrong; I'm just providing a list of folks relevant to the discussion you can follow up with if you wish. 28bytes (talk) 00:55, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I checked a couple of these who I know best and will continue to work throu:::gh the list on the morrow. Some are still engaged and making non-trivial edits and actions, just not very many of them. I'll think on this but I think in most cases just a gentle nudge along the lines of "there's plenty to do..." may be the best way to solve the problem. UninvitedCompany 01:20, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    @UninvitedCompany: you may want to look for matches against this list as well, which is admins that have no logged actions (any actions - even a 'thanks') in over a year - or perhaps focus on the 13 that haven't had any logged actions in over 10 years. — xaosflux Talk 02:13, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    If nobody's mentioned it lately, thaks for your attention to this, I'm sure it isn't the funnest job in the world.
    And thanks as well to Uninvited Company for stepping up here, even if it doesn't go anywhere it's nice to know someone is looking into it and you seem like a good fit for the task, your message to Revolving Bugbear was on point but not confrontational, a good tone for this sort of business. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:18, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks. UninvitedCompany 11:15, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I've thought on this and believe that the best way forward is to put together a page or WikiProject with a working title of "administrative retention" or similar with a primary goal of encouraging less active administrators to re-engage with the project. After all, the best possible outcome for enwp is to have these talented people back as active, energetic, engaged contributors. That's not going to happen in every case, but the possibilities for success increase as we work our way up the list through people who are, for lack of a better turn of phrase, "less inactive." There are some common reasons for people to drift away (c.f. some of the pages and essays on admin burnout) that we can address. There are a handful of very specific changes to the nature of the project since the 2009 era (picking a date about ten years ago out of the air; in general, people on the lists above were most active during that time) that are worth covering. And there are chronically understaffed areas where it is relatively easy for experienced contributors to make a difference without becoming engaged in high-conflict drama that leads to burnout.

    Once that's done I'd like to link to it as a resource in individual discussions with less active administrators. I believe strongly that the messages should be individually crafted, but to make it easier, I'd like to be able to link to this more general information.

    A desirable side effect of all this is that for people who aren't going to re-engage, these resources should help them to clarify their thinking, and encourage them to find a way to leave the project on a positive, mutually respectful note. UninvitedCompany 11:15, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    That sounds like a positive idea, and if you do start up such a project, please do add me as it's something I'd like to help with. I do think that we'd need to have something written, explaining why dormant admin accounts are a problem - I understand the current concerns about hijacked accounts, but there are far more issues with dormant accounts. They over inflate the number of admins figure, and give a feeling of complacency that there are enough people to do the job. This in turn will lead to RfA being a more unpleasant area - it's easy to have over-inflated standards if there are enough people to pick up the work. Talking to admins who are less active is a great idea, discussing the likelihood of their return and helping encourage that return. If they are unable to commit to returning, then discussing the harm of keeping the tool. WormTT(talk) 11:53, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    This topic has come up a number of times over the years, and this may be the best idea I've heard in relation to inactive administrators. Useight's Public Sock (talk) 22:32, 7 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Work in process at Wikipedia:WikiProject Editor Retention/administrators, please edit mercilessly. UninvitedCompany 21:59, 9 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I've started contacting people (on talk + email) as noted in the list above. I'm going slow, deliberately, because I'm writing individual notes. UninvitedCompany 17:26, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Security as the main concern for inactive administrators

    The main issue that concerns me is that inactive sysop accounts are ripe for being stolen without anybody noticing. The most complete solution is to find a developer and create software to do the following:

    1. Scan all sysop account passwords to see if they match any of the compromised passwords in the HaveIBeenPwned.com (HIBP) list. For our purposes, we call any matching password a “weak password.” This testing can be done with k-anonymous hashing to maintain password security during scanning.
    2. Deactivate any sysop account that’s using a weak password.
    3. Email the sysops that have been deactivated and invite them to recover their account if they wish to continue.

    After we agree what the policy should be, then we communicate that to the developers. Jehochman Talk 13:15, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    @Jehochman: password audits have been requested, you can follow phab:T121186 for status on this and related activity. — xaosflux Talk 14:13, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    It's funny, just the last couple of days I've been looking at some of the things I had been working on, checking my Wikipedia-related emails, and went through the last major issue that lead me to decrease and eventually withdraw from most Wikipedia activity in the first place. It's somewhat sad to see how many of the folks that I used to interact with are no longer active, having retired or, like me, perform the occasional edit. At the same time, it is heartening to find at least a few people still being very active. I do check Wikipedia all the time and still make minor edits, but it was a bit eye-opening to go back into some of the conflicts (the majority of which was off-wiki) to see why I started to withdraw in the first place. I do follow (somewhat) the progression via avenues such as the Signpost and the Admin's Newsletter, but most of my activity these days is restricted to the mainspace, some of it while not logged in.

    If security is your main issue, perhaps all these low-activity admins (including myself) require is a strong suggestion to enable 2FA. It might be problematic to see which admins have strong passwords (or perhaps not, since Jehochman is recommending the deactivation of any admin with a weak password), but it shouldn't be too much of an issue to check which admins have enabled 2FA. --Deathphoenix ʕ 15:03, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    As I've spoken about at length in the above threads, I belive security is of course a valid concern, but that out-of-touch admins is an equal concern. The community would seem to lean in that direction as well, as evidenced by the passage of the five-year clause earlier this year. No amount of additional security can educate an admin who hasn't actually done admin work in half a decade or more on what current standards and practices are. We've had 2 arbcom cases this year related to users with barely-used advanced permissions suddenly barging around using their tools as weapons, and much drama was had. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:50, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Could you please clarify what cases you're talking about? UninvitedCompany 22:05, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    @UninvitedCompany: I assume one of them is Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fred Bauder, but it's not like the problem here was Fred being unaware of the current rules. Most certainly he knew that unblocking yourself is about the biggest no-no there is and has been for a long, long time - at least since whenever it became impossible to delete the main page. Any problems of someone not being aware of current norms, but being willing to learn them, can be resolved in a brief message on their talk page. The problem is when someone doesn't care what the current norms are (which has nothing to do with the age of their account). --B (talk) 22:18, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    I presume the other is Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Andrevan, although it was dismissed by motion following resignation while proceedings were underway. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 23:00, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    That's what I would have guessed, but Fred was never inactive by any sort of reasonable definition of activity. Less active than he once was, sure, but he's consistently had several hundred edits a year, and multiple logged admin actions. The reason this is important is that I don't think there's any sort of pattern of problems that returning admins pose that are not posed to just as great a degree by admins that have never been inactive. UninvitedCompany 23:04, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Crat activity review

    It might be worth also looking at the low activity Bureaucrats as well, currently, there are two Bureaucrats who have been inactive for 9 months.
    Ceccropia's last 100 edits go back to 2011, and Pakaran to 2014. Perhaps reaching out to them an encuring they have enabled 2FA or perhaps have ensured their accounts are secure would be a good idea. --Cameron11598 (Talk) 19:33, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    @Cameron11598: we usually review the ourselves about once a year, see Wikipedia:Bureaucrat activity. — xaosflux Talk 19:44, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Wikipedia’s implementation of 2FA is not yet robust. It’s very easy to get permanently locked out. I don’t recommend it. I’m building something better but it will take time. Jehochman Talk 20:43, 6 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Hi all, as we've been talking about relative activity standards recently, I went over to Wikipedia:Bureaucrat activity/report, and at first glance it appears that we have one 'crat (Addshore), who hasn't met the current 'crat activity standards for 4 months and another (Kingturtle), who won't meet the activity requirements in ~2 months. Raising it here both to give the users in question a heads up, since that doesn't seem to have been done/seems unlikely to be done, but also to raise it for the community since we don't seem to have followed 'crat activity closely. TonyBallioni (talk) 00:17, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Thanks for the note. I'd say we look at this twice a year or so, so we might not be getting to inactive bureaucrats right at the deadline. We did have a bot-generated report but that hasn't been functional in a while. –xenotalk 01:37, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    I flagged back in February that we next needed to look at activity in September (Wikipedia talk:Bureaucrat activity/report), but it slipped my mind (and presumably that of other bureaucrats too). Maybe we need some kind of wiki alarm clock / reminder bot? WJBscribe (talk) 13:06, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    The list of 'crats, and more importantly the list of inactive crats, is so small that managing it by bot seems like overkill. I think that just like with that admin inactivity discussion above, engaging our inactive crats and asking them if they would like to stay active is worthwhile, and better done personally. — xaosflux Talk 14:44, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    I meant a more personal bot, i.e. one that I could ask to message me on my talkpage in X month's time to remind me about something... WJBscribe (talk) 18:08, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    m:Community Wishlist Survey 2019/Notifications/Article reminders Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:09, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    It's not so much a bot to handle notifications, etc., I agree we should do the notifications ourselves- but having an automated process generating the bureaucrat activity report (as best as automation can) would be more convenient. From what I understand you and WJBscribe had to prepare the last report manually, which I"m sure took some time. –xenotalk 18:09, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, an automated report was the starting point, but it then needed quite a bit of manual updating. That's going to be fairly unavoidable where the activity criteria include participating as a bureaucrat in cratchats and this noticeboard, and indeed posting (anywhere) that one remains available to perform bureaucrat actions. We have Addshore now, then Pakaran and Kingturtle (for different reasons) in February 2019 if they do not resume the relevant activity requirement, then it looks like it'll be over a year before this needs looking at again. WJBscribe (talk) 18:16, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    The report Madman used to run for us picked up BN edits, bureaucrat discussion edits, etc. (Special:PermanentLink/691208262), so it was a great starting point before having to dig for ancillary bureaucrat actions. Unfortunately I think he did not retain the code, thinking it was a one-off request or somesuch. It would need to be re-written from scratch. (FYI, Addshore has self-requested removal at SRP) –xenotalk 18:22, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    As to asking bureaucrats to stay active, I suspect we will be met with the response that - now renaming is no longer a crat action and there's less than 1 successful RfA per month - there isn't actually much for bureaucrats to do. Someone should count the number of bureaucrat logged actions (+/- bot; +/- sysop) in 2018, I suspect it'll be around 25-30. Obviously there's more to the job than just the logged actions, but we can't avoid the issue that there's simply a lot less for bureaucrats to do than there used to be... WJBscribe (talk) 18:13, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Well, those, and now +/- interface administrator. UninvitedCompany 18:31, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    @WJBscribe: just a quick count on my own log for 2018 has ~100 rights actions (13x +bot; 13x -bot; 5x +sysop; 60x -sysop; 8x +iadmin; 1x -iadmin). — xaosflux Talk 20:47, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    As noted in Xaosflux' stats, it's not so much RfAs needing tending to as inactive sysops. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 21:09, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Moreover, xaos is also pretty much single-handedly carrying out the monthly -sysops, and the +iadmin was largely a one-off surge when the right came into being. –xenotalk 21:18, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Ran some numbers for you, WJBscribe. See: User:SQL/Cratstats. SQLQuery me! 22:03, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    In summary, 11 out of 23 have performed at least one logged action in 2018. Mkdw talk 22:12, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Oh, whoa...I only have one logged bureaucratic action this year! Rest assured that I am otherwise engaged as I do read everything that occurs on this page, sometimes comment, am ready to participate in any bureaucrat chats that arise and I can close RfAs/de-or-resysop users but the last few times I've attempted to do so, another bureaucrat got there a minute before I did. :o Acalamari 23:35, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    11 out of 21 (2 have since been removed) and further Crat activity states "Bureaucrat activity is widely construed and includes acting or commenting as a bureaucrat at any venue including WP:BN/RFA/RFB/RFBAG/BRFA and responding to requests in their capacity as a global renamer or signalling that they remain actively engaged and available for bureaucrat tasks".Hence if crats merely comment in WP:BN/RFA/RFB/RFBAG/BRFA or even merely state that remain actively engaged and available for bureaucrat tasks they are considered active even if they is no logged action or have not part in crat chat .Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 23:21, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Yeah, you can add Deskana, Useight, and Uninvited Company at least to the "this years list" of engaged 'crats. I think Avi also has done a few renames and has said he's will to 'crat if needed. Maybe a few more can be added. I think the point is that we still have a relatively large percentage who don't exactly do anything even when something comes up. I'm not necessarily suggesting a stricter 'crat activity standard, but recognizing where we are TonyBallioni (talk) 23:37, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    It is mostly that we don't have backlogs - because even when we have a backlog of 1 minute we get piles of editors screaming at us </semi-sarc> — xaosflux Talk 23:39, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    I wasn't trying to be snarky (though yours is warranted ) and I actually very much value having 'crats around to comment without logged actions. I think my comment was more of even considering the ability of just commenting on a board when needed, we have a relatively high percentage who don't do that , which I think is fair. TonyBallioni (talk) 23:42, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Like what others said, there's almost no RFAs, usernames got usurped, Outside of the occasional button press there's very little. Wizardman 23:47, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    I was just going to post something similar. There aren't backlogs to work down. Typically RFAs are closed within a minute or two of running to completion -- as a practical matter, you have to plan ahead and set an alarm to do one. Requests here are more a matter of checking the page often. The inactivity desysops could perhaps be rotated among whoever wants to do them, and would be a good way to distribute the workload, if that is a useful goal. The original rationale for the "broadly construed" criteria was, I believe, based on the premise that the project is not well served by having the 'crats compete for the rights changes. Sometimes it is better to discuss first. Sometimes the very best thing the bureaucrats can do with a request is: Nothing at all. UninvitedCompany 23:48, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    I have never heard of a project where crat activity is tied to a number of crat actions, however, there are many projects where it is tied to the number of administrator actions. I am a crat on Wikidata, and sometimes I do not make crat actions (RFA, interface admin, or bot flag) in months, but if I fail to make 5 administrator actions in 6 months, I lose both flags and will have to go through a new RfA if I need them back.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:54, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    By policy, we don't require adminship as a requisite for adminship (though in practice we do). Personally, I think it should be so if so loss of admin would also de-crat. — xaosflux Talk 23:11, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Have we ever had a situation where someone met the criteria for being an inactive admin without meeting the criteria for being an inactive 'crat? UninvitedCompany 23:26, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    It is not currently possible as both groups have a removal in 1 year if no edits or logs of any kind. Should any of the admin inactivity proposals requiring logged actions pass then it would be. — xaosflux Talk 00:51, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    New Wikimedia password policy and requirements

    The Wikimedia Foundation security team is implementing a new password policy and requirements. You can learn more about the project on MediaWiki.org.

    These new requirements will apply to new accounts and privileged accounts. New accounts will be required to create a password with a minimum length of 8 characters. Privileged accounts will be prompted to update their password to one that is at least 10 characters in length.

    These changes are planned to be in effect on December 13th. If you think your work or tools will be affected by this change, please let us know on the talk page.

    Thank you!

    CKoerner (WMF) (talk) 21:14, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    @Nihonjoe: 1) No. Those who have passwords that meet the new requirements can carry-on with business as usual. (From mw:Topic:Upxmrje0k1sl146k) — xaosflux Talk 22:04, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Awesome. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 00:31, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Desysop request (There'sNoTime)

    There'sNoTime (current rights · rights management · rights log (local) · rights log (global/meta) · block log)

    Hi - please remove the administrator right from my account. Thank you. - TNT 💖 22:45, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
     Done. Hope to see you back soon. 28bytes (talk) 22:48, 12 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Proposed procedural change for desysops for inactivity

    In light of some of the discussions upthread, I'd like to propose a change to how we implement the inactivity desysops. The purpose of the change would be to be sure that all bureaucrats have the opportunity to perform logged rights changes if they wish to do so:

    1. Community approved policy and procedure remains unchanged.
    2. For the first 24 hours after the list of admins to be desysopped for inactivity is published, bureaucrats who have made no rights changes in the preceding 90 days may each process one desysop for inactivity, if they wish to do so.
    3. Subsequently, any bureaucrat may process any of the remaining desysops for inactivity.

    This would have the effect of spreading out the workload and being sure that each 'crat who wishes to be involved in user rights changes has the opportunity to do so, in a predictable, scheduled fashion.

    Over time, it may lay the groundwork for simplifying the 'crat inacvitity policy, since it should result in a situation where all active 'crats are performing rights changes every year.

    UninvitedCompany 00:21, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    • Oppose we don't need make-work procedures for bureaucrats, they can stay "active" just by discussing things here. — xaosflux Talk 00:34, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • Don't care either way. Xaosflux does all of it, anyway, as evidenced by the link someone posted in another discussion, above. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 00:36, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Ha! I actually have been trying to avoid bot flaggings and sysopings lately just to "share the wealth" though really these things are just like any other chore - we don't say "hold of on WP:PERM's" until the ~300 sysops that have 0 logged actions in a year have a chance. — xaosflux Talk 00:50, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Maybe we should have a "schedule" of sorts, where 2-3 of us are "on duty" for a given week, and handle any needs that come up during that week. That might share the wealth, as you say. Just a thought that has been rattling around for a few days. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 00:59, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • The truth is, when I drafted the bureaucrat activity policy I basically made it impossible for a bureaucrat to be removed for inactivity unless they completely ignore the bureaucratic realm entirely. Even Acalamari's "We are here! We are here! We are here!" comment has refreshed their bureaucrat standing for three years. –xenotalk 01:15, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't think it's that bad of an idea at all. Might be a nice way of giving otherwise inactive 'crats a chance to dip their toe in on a monthly basis. But then again I'm not the one doing all the inactivity desysopings, so I'll defer to Mr. Flux, who is. 28bytes (talk) 02:17, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The one frequent activity where I'd really like to see more 'crat action is resysop requests - even if it just a "looks fine" comment, having some comments show that we are properly reviewing the requests to ensure the requirements are in place. Do we need 20 comments on each - certainly not, but a 2 or 3 help to show you are active and show the community that we are here. — xaosflux Talk 02:33, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm tryng to make sur eI understand the point here, which to me seems to be to make sure 'crats have something to do, not to help resolve backlogs or anything like that? Beeblebrox (talk) 04:51, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      The point seems to be to give crats the chance to do specific crat-tasks in order to avoid being classified as "inactive" by some policy that requires logged activity to maintain crat status. I agree with xaosflux and Xeno though that cratting does not necessarily mean doing some kind of logged action since discussing things is equally important. After all, if there is a crat chat for an RFA, a dozen crats might be involved but only one can flip the bit if that's the consensus. Regards SoWhy 08:14, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose Doesn't seem very "Wiki" to me. The important thing is that the work gets done, not who does it. If we have too many crats, then we should have less. We shouldn't stop the ones who are doing work, to allow other people to do the work - that seems like madness... WormTT(talk) 10:03, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      "Too many crats" is the same as "too many admins": No such thing exists. Regards SoWhy 10:44, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      If that were true, every editor should be a crat. I'm not saying we do have too many, I think that we have about the right amount, but that if people believe we have too many due to the inactivity of some, they should look to remove some. WormTT(talk) 10:46, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      Just like any editor who can be trusted with the tools should be an admin, any admin who can be trusted with the additional tools should be a crat. For example, on es-wiki, all admins are crats and that project still have not gone up in flames. As Ammarpad correctly points out, Wikipedia is a volunteer service, so our goal should be to have as many people as possible able to do what needs to be done. Regards SoWhy 11:10, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      An obvious problem with having all admins being crats is the same reason why all admins are not interface admins - it creates a risk if an account is compromised. In this case a compromised admin/crat account could desysop every other admin on the wiki, making it harder to stop them in their tracks speedily.  — Amakuru (talk) 22:41, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
      That could easily be solved software-wise, for example by limiting the number of desysops possible within a certain time frame. Also, recent events have shown that stewards are capable to react to such developments rather quickly. Regards SoWhy 08:22, 14 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't think trying to create work for bureaucrats out of no work is the solution here. Also fixed spreading of work (rostering) is quite contrary to the ethos and principles of Wikipedia. The top few lines at WP:VOLUNTEER explain this succinctly –Ammarpad (talk) 10:28, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • Per Xaosflux, extra bureaucratic procedures to ensure some of the team get a hand in the fiddly bits doesn't make sense to me, as either efficient or effective, and certainly seems contrived. Likewise per Xf, we have constructed our crat activity rules to allow for input and participation in discussions like this (or even intention to do so), and as there isn't much work to go around, giving their advice and counsel is the more valuable thing any might do. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 11:46, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose as unnecessary. -- KTC (talk) 12:01, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • As a side note, do we really have to immediately launch into bolded !voting? Can we not just discuss things a bit without lining up into teams? Who knows, even if the originally proposed suggestion isn't the way to go, maybe some more interesting and useful ideas will shake out. 28bytes (talk) 13:13, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • The point made by Xaosflux above is an excellent one; more scrutiny of resysop requests would also help maintain the integrity of that process. If we're looking at satisfying a bureaucratic requirement here, surely the easiest "fix" is to define such a comment as equivalent to a logged bureaucrat action. to encourage participation in resysop requests. Spreading the paperwork around does seem contrary to our philosophy, per WTT. It also strikes me somewhat as a solution in search of a problem, in that the issues typically associated with inactive privileged accounts (security, being out of touch with the community) would not be fixed by this process, unless the increased opportunity to take bureaucrat actions is accompanied by a tightening of the activity standards. To be quite honest, I'm far more concerned about the few hundred active or marginally active admins: I found one today whose last admin action seems to have been in 2012, whose last 50 edits go back to 2014, who has logged less than a 100 admin actions since they passed RFA in 2005 with 16 supports. If we're concerned about inactivity, that's the sort of user we should be concerned about, not so much crats who have too few logged actions. Vanamonde (talk) 16:06, 13 December 2018 (UTC) Modified per reply to Amory. Vanamonde (talk) 16:24, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Baffled. I see no problem in need of fixing here. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 22:29, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Well, maybe I didn't lay out the rationale very well, or maybe it's just a bad idea. Here are some thoughts and replies:

    • An ongoing pattern with the promotions and other bureaucrat-specific work is that we tend to have lengthy periods where the vast majority of promotions (etc) are performed by one 'crat. At one point in history, a certain 'crat performed substantially all RFA promotions (there were then typically over a dozen per month) within seconds of closure. I'm not certain when that particular individual slept. Things have improved since then but the number of promotions have decreased. The goal of the proposal is to provide an opportunity for more 'crats to be invovled in actual use of the tools without having to check WP:BN multiple times per day or set an alarm clock for the moment an RFA concludes.
    • The activity policy we have now is unnecessarily complex to implement and IMO is unlikely to survive ongoing community scrutiny. I think it was the right approach at the time it was adopted, and it was useful in dealing with 'crats who were granted the tools without asking for them and who never had any serious interest in the work. A barrier to a simpler policy based solely on logged actions is that it is quite possible to check WP:BN, WP:RFA, etc. every day for a month and still not have an opportunity to do any work.
    • I thought of various sorts of "rostering" ideas and also dismissed them as being too unwikilike. Hence the 24 hour window, enough that anyone who wants to be involved in the work here can make a rights change. There's nothing time critical about the monthly desysoppings; if there were, we'd run the reports daily. I don't think there's any benefit to the project or the community in having all the monthly desysoppings performed immediately by one person rather than as a group effort during a 1 day hold (with, in likely practice, one person doing the leftovers at the end).
    • If anyone has other ideas on how to spread the workload out without introducing delays or complexity in areas that matter, bring them on.

    UninvitedCompany 23:01, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    That does makes a bit more sense now, thanks. But participating here, for example, is a really important Crat task and any of us can do that without artificially dividing up "work". --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 23:03, 13 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

    Suicide

    [copied over from "User talk:Jimbo Wales" because I think this might be the best place for it.]

    In September, I suggested that the Wikipedia article about "suicide" could offer help, such as phone numbers to prevention help lines. Jimbo Wales said, "In general, I think it's a good idea". Nothing has happened. This is a small change that could save lives.

    Archive ref: [1] Suicide (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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