Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Fram 2

Fram

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Nomination

Fram (talk · contribs) – Hi, I'm Fram, a Dutch-speaking editor from Belgium, editor since 2005 and admin from 2007 until 2019. For those of you unaware of what happened since, all the details can be found at WP:FRAM and Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Fram.

I've certainly had strong differences of opinion with Fram in the past, but despite that I have no hesitation nominating Fram nor in strongly supporting this RFA. While Wikipedia is generally and rightfully egalitarian in its approach to everything, if you're not familiar with the background here in this particular case you probably shouldn't comment (either in support or opposition) until you've at least skimmed the history at WP:FRAMBAN as this is an exceptional case.

At different and relatively recent times I've previously described Fram as arguably the best admin in Wikipedia's history and described his conduct as an atrocious mix of unnecessary overpersonalization, extreme defensiveness when challenged, lashing out at anyone he feels isn't sufficiently agreeing with him, and a general attitude that his opinions are invariably correct and it's his duty to bludgeon them through regardless of opposition, and I stand by both opinions. Fram has a genuine, and rare, talent for spotting the core of a problem, and an even rarer willingness to challenge problematic conduct without fear or favor, even when doing so means alleging misconduct on the part of people who are used to intimidating critics into silence. In the past Fram has also been arrogant, obnoxious, and unwilling to admit any alternative explanation for a given event than his preferred theory.

However, Fram was warned about his conduct in 2018, and since then the issues that caused concern have been virtually non-existent. Despite having literally hundreds of editors going through his contributions (initially looking for something to justify T&S's original ban of him, subsequently trying to find evidence for the arbcom case), nobody has managed to find anything untoward other than a couple of grumpy comments. Although Arbcom are unable to release exactly what the claimed evidence T&S used to support their ban was, they have confirmed that it was based entirely on on-wiki activity, and as such if there was anything problematic it would have come to light. As far as I can tell from what's either been officially made public or has slipped into public knowledge, none of the complaints was legitimate grounds for desysopping, at least one of the complaints was an outright and demonstrable lie, and there's a strong suggestion that Fram was blocked not for anything he did wrong, but for investigating too closely a small group of well-connected people engaged in inappropriate activities.

In light of all this, I believe Fram should have admin status restored for two different reasons. There's the procedural view, that since the entire set of circumstances that led to Fram losing admin status was illegitimate we should return to the status quo of 9 June, and if someone has genuine evidence of any kind of misconduct they should present it so a legitimate case can be held within Wikipedia's accepted processes. (If the reasons for not making the allegations public are legitimate, I assume it's safe to say that everyone involved is by now aware of where to find Special:EmailUser/Arbitration Committee.) I find that procedural argument convincing, but even if one discounts it completely I would still support Fram for admin at this time. The last significant conduct of any concern was more than a year ago—a lifetime in wiki-terms—and since then Fram has demonstrated consistently good judgment, often in very difficult circumstances and has consistently worked in areas such as New Page Patrol where having access to the admin toolset would be useful. As such, even setting aside everything that happened in the last three months, this is a candidate to whom I would give a straightforward support based on their activity over the past year and a demonstrable use for the tools. ‑ Iridescent 22:11, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Co-nomination by Xeno: I’m not asking you to restore Fram’s administrator privileges in order to reverse what has been (to put it mildly) a rather unfortunate series of events, though that would be a sufficient reason also. I’m asking you to re-instate Fram because despite the treatment Fram has received at the hands of WMF/T&S, and subsequently, the Arbitration Committee, Fram still believes deeply in the project and is still committed to maintaining quality control in our product. No administrator is perfect and Fram is no exception. In the past Fram has been curt (sometimes even uncivil) with users they have dealt with administratively. So have I. So have any number of administrators. From Wikipedia:Administrators#Administrator conduct: “Occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with adminship; administrators are not expected to be perfect.” However, the committee wants us to accept, sight unseen, that Fram has engaged in “sustained or serious disruption of Wikipedia ... incompatible with the expectations and responsibilities of administrators, and [shown] consistent or egregious poor judgment.” (Ibid.) This is simply not borne out by the evidence presented. Fram has made mistakes. Fram has not always been the model of civility. However, Fram has committed to self-introspection and improving their mode of interactions with other editors and the evidence has shown progress in this goal. To refuse to reinstate Fram’s administrative privileges is to engage in punishment, not prevention, and this is not the Wikipedia way. We’ve already lost a significant percentage of our active administrators (and many have significantly curtailed their activity) resulting from the unprecedented actions that were taken against Fram. Let’s not lose another one. –xeno^talk 12:18, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Co-nomination by Chowbok: It's no secret that I'm doing this (my first admin nomination) because I feel a massive injustice has been done to Fram, and it needs to be undone as soon as possible. But I've also had time to look at Fram's contributions as an editor and decisions as an admin, and I must say that I would strongly support his/her getting the admin bit even if this unpleasantness had never happened. While there are some legitimate concerns about Fram's occasional sharp tongue, there's no doubt it my mind that he/she had greatly improved in this respect in the months before the ban, and, more importantly, will be on his/her best behavior going forward, knowing that his/her conduct will be scrutinized like no admin ever before. Being able to take a stand on principle that also unquestionably benefits the project is a win-win, and I strongly encourage everyone to vote to re-grant Fram the tools.—Chowbok ☠ 00:12, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Co-nomination by Lourdes: If this would have been a regular nomination statement, I might have started with showcasing Fram's Featured Lists or Good Article, or the fact that they've written more than a thousand articles, or that more than 62% of their 175,039 edits are to main space...and so on, so forth. But this is obviously not a regular nomination, leave alone a regular RfA. It's an RfA which I'm leading to support to take a stand. To be honest, and as Chowbok says, I too would have nominated Fram even if they'd not gone through the recent saga. I've known Fram for enough time to have had significant disagreements and agreements with them, to have my opinions on their actions and to have their opinions on my actions. And through all this, I've come to realise the value of their contributions. Fram is an absolute net positive, as an editor and as an administrator. They've made mistakes, and I have had no love lost for them in my interactions. But as xeno says above, Fram's been made to go through the shame of thrones with eyes blindfolded and hands tied. And irrespective of what the Foundation's response has been, if things have to be brought to square one by the community, it has to start here – where it's not just my stand or xeno's or Chowbok's, it's the stand of the community that has to prove this point to the powers-that-be... That we are not slaves to Big Brother, and we're ready to bite back when bitten. I consider Fram's RfA a cause I will not back down from; I hope the community joins me in this call for action and supports Fram's RfA. Lourdes 13:21, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here:

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as an administrator. Please answer these questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. What administrative work do you intend to take part in?

A: The same as before, i.e. mainly new page patrolling (for all new pages, including those by autopatrolled editors), copyvio checks, some handling of AN and ANI cases, checking new tools or software in general, which includes checking how these work for admins (e.g. we have had in the past some things where people could create pages on enwiki but no one could delete them), and checking DYKs on the Main Page to get rid of errors. My Adminstats show that in 12 years time, I made some 28000 admin actions (which excludes things like editing through protection, necessary for main page maintenance), the vast majority of them deletions.

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

A: Apart from my admin contributions, and keeping an eye on the articles on my watchlist, I try to continue creating content. While I have in the past written some GAs and contributed to some FAs, my main contributions are usually less well developed, just basic articles containing all necessary information. Some articles I'm proud of (ones I started or where I am a main contributor) are Exposition des primitifs flamands à Bruges, which recreates in word and image one of the most important art historical exhibitions ever; Leuchtenberg Gallery, a Featured List about a no longer existing early museum; Antidotarium Nicolai, an important medieval book about medicines; La finta pazza, a popular 17th century opera; some sporting biographies I started, like Nafissatou Thiam, Wout van Aert, Laurens Devos or Willy De Bruijn; Nazi art dealer Alois Miedl; or "firsts", like the first cookbook ever printed or the first dedicated photography exhibition in the world or the first printer in the Americas.

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: Yes, there have been a number of conflicts. In February-March 2018, I got too confrontational, leading to legitimate complaints; I realized that I had unnecessarily antagonised people, and took care to take a more neutral, less personal approach in my adminning thereafter. I have also, as I explained in discussions during the ArbCom case, tried to take care not to be sole admin involved with prolonged or complicated cases, but to bring issues to admin noticeboards for further comments (see for example Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive299#Bach editing from June 2018), or to make sure that others have tried to solve problems or to warn editors about some issues as well. The "job" I do in new page patrolling or copyvio checking is a necessary one, and one that often leads to unhappy "customers", editors who are trying to (or in the case of paid editors usually pretending to) help enwiki, and who don't understand why their edits aren't welcomed no questions asked. But I'm not the only one doing this job by far, at enwiki we luckily have a large pool of editors trying to maintain some basic quality standards, and I have to let go of some problems sometimes and let others deal with it.

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Discussion

RfAs for this user:

• Requests for adminship/Fram
• Requests for adminship/Fram 2

• Links for Fram: Fram (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
• Edit summary usage for Fram can be found here.

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