User:Canyouhearmenow/Admin coaching

Are you ready to wield the mop?

Since admin coaching often consists of asking questions and what-if scenarios, we'll just start with the traditional RFA questions.

Traditional RFA questions

• What admin areas do you intend to work in?
  • I think I will continue to work in the Christian Music area creating and patrolling new articles. I also want to continue working to clean up the pornography sections. I think they contain way to much advertisment and POV. I would at some point like to address the issue of the WP:Notability qualifications dealing with the porno articles. As it reads now, the only thing one has to do in that category is to have won an award. I do not really agree with that. Plus they accept the web pages for these people and those pages contain graphic and sexually explicit material that is pure advertisement. In many cases offering sexual services and escort treatments.

• What conflicts have caused you stress and how have you dealt with them? How have you learned from them?
  • The only real conflict that I have had is with editors who strong arm newbies. I think as an admin I would want to really be on the lookout for that because it did cause me stress. I was trying to learn my way around and found out that the more I tried, the more there were certain editors who came up against me. I had a very nice admin who finally told them to back off and made them realize I was a newbie. I learned that in cases such as this, I had to maintain a great deal of civility and to take the upper road. I have learned from working with other editors less experienced than myself that it is important to show them how to do something because sometimes it's not as easy for them to learn just by being told. That is why I appreciate what you did when you showed me the example of the cite web. It helped me a great deal and now I can show that to someone else and help them with it!

• What do you believe are your best contributions?
  • I think my best contributions so far has been the ability to help other editors who are working on articles that they become discouraged with. They don't really understand how to structure them or how to write them with less fluff. I redid most of the verbiage in the Ft. Lauderdale article and reduced the fluff; changed the sentence structures so they read easier. This in turn gave that editor more time to research and together we took it to a GA article. So, to answer this question, I think my best contributions so far has been my ability to show I can be a part of this community and show people that it can be fun to work together!

Admins

First, I want to make sure you know what admins do. An administrator or sysop doesn't have any real "status" in the sense of discussion. All editors are equal. Admins do not have any special say in disputes, and don't have any special cleanup powers. Administrators work mostly in the down-'n'-dirty maintenance areas. These include

• Rollbacking vandalism and giving other users rollback priveleges. By the way, if you don't have rollback already, I think you are experienced enough for rollback. You can request it at WP:RFR. Rollback allows quick reversion of edits, but SHOULD UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES be used to revert good-faith edits or for edit-warring.
• Blocking users. Users may be blocked for vandalism, disruption, spamming, edit-warring, sock-puppetry, making personal attacks or legal threats, or per decision of the community, ArbCom, or the Foundation. Blocking is not punitive. It is preventative; it prevents more harm to the encyclopedia. By blocking, a vandal can be stopped and perhaps deterred from vandalism. Usually, blatant vandals, socks, and trolls may be blocked on sight, but more controversial blocks should be discussed. Blocking is not equivalent to banning either, although banning may involve blocks.
• Protecting pages. When pages are heavily vandalized or edit-warred, the page may be protected. There are two types of protection: semi-protection, which prevents IPs and accounts under 5 days old to edit, and full-protection, which prevents anybody from editing except for sysops. Semi-protection is usually used in the case of heavy IP vandalism. Full-protection is usually used in cases of edit wars, repeated recreation of deleted material, or the insertion of libel. More rarer cases include in cases of move vandalism, a highly-used template, or abuse of unblock templates. Once in a very blue moon a page will be protected due to office actions, meaning that the Wikimedia Foundation has protected something because of legal circumstances. These should not be toyed with.
• Deleting pages and restoring them back. When pages are not encyclopedic, they are deleted. Pages may be deleted through speedy deletion, proposed deletion, or community discussion via XFDs. Speedy deletion is when an administrator directly deletes an article uncontroversially because it obviously does not fit in the encyclopedia. The criteria for such a deletion is in WP:CSD. Proposed deletion is for slightly more controversial deletions, where articles may not fit in the criteria for speedy deletion but may be deleted nonetheless. XFD is where the community forms a consensus on whether a page should be deleted. A page in XFD may be kept, deleted, merged, redirected, or transwikied. Deletion is one of the most powerful tools and is therefore one of the most dangerous as well. It has the capability to cause mass community uproar or even crash Wikipedia (this happens when a page has too many revisions to delete and swamps the servers). Therefore, deletion should be treated like a gun: only shoot at the enemy or designated targets. Anything else can result in serious trouble. Deletion is not set in stone, however. Deleted material can be viewed by admins, and they can also be restored by consensus at Deletion review. Restoring deleted material should only be done with consent or discussion.

In short, admins only have augmented abilities when it comes to maintenance. When it comes to discussion and consensus, they are equal with any other established editor. Jimbo once said:

I just wanted to say that becoming a sysop is *not a big deal*.

I think perhaps I'll go through semi-willy-nilly and make a bunch of people who have been around for awhile sysops. I want to dispel the aura of "authority" around the position. It's merely a technical matter that the powers given to sysops are not given out to everyone.

I don't like that there's the apparent feeling here that being granted sysop status is a really special thing.

Sysoppery is no big deal. Some editors I know make adminship like a goal, like there was some crown or glory to it. Seriously, we're all normal people. A few extra buttons makes no big deal. Keep that in mind always. However, administrators are expected to carry good conduct, to not bite the newcomers, and overall just act as a role model. Administrators have a duty to teach and communicate with other users. That's why I think admin coaching is so great. It helps me hopefully teach you something you didn't know.

I want you to read up on the following materials to understand what adminship is and what you need to comprehend it:

• Administrators  Done
• Bureaucrats  Done I have reviewed this section.
• Guide to RfA  Done I guess my only question here is that it states that editors with edits between 1000 to 2000 are usually not looked upon favorably for passing. How do you think this will affect me with an edit history of 1,647 edits?
• Arguments to avoid  Done I think if you review my history of dealing with other editors, you will find that I try not to get into any form of arguments. If I do not understand something I will take it to another editor or admin for resolution. So I think in this case, I would refer back to you as to how I should handle a certain question being posed or anything that even has a hint of controversy outside my expertise.
• Admin reading list  Done
• Admin how-to guide  Done

Generally, people don't like to support people with 1-2k edits. Usually this is done out of some arbitrary criteria, but I think that this may have had its grounding in that there's not much to look at with 2000 edits. Until more experience and editing is done, I think that the first edit-count voters might have not felt too good supporting someone they were not sure had fully experienced the wide spectrum of activity in Wikipedia. Of course, some people are fast learners and others are slow, so edit-counting really isn't as strong of an argument presently. For you, you only need more editing experience, and you should be fine. I consider around around 3000 edits as a good threshold to consider being an admin. It sounds like a lot of editing but it really isn't.

Checklist

Here's a checklist of things you should take a look at. Please tell me which ones you've done and which ones you haven't. If you haven't tried any, give it a whirl! After all, variety is the spice of life. For people who don't really have the willpower to focus on a task like me, I like to go around working on different parts of the project.

Have you:

• !voted in an RFA?  Done [1],
• Listed a vandal at WP:AIV?
• Requested page protection at WP:RPP?
• Tagged an article for speedy deletion, PROD, AFD?  Done tagged several for notability and speedy deletion.
• Critiqued another user at WP:ER?
• Received the Signpost or otherwise read it?  Done Enjoy this!
• Used automated tools (TWINKLE, popups, VandalProof, .js tools, etc.)?  Done I received the rollback button and use it often
• What XFD's have you participated in?
• Posted or answered a question at the Reference Desk or the Help Desk?
• Uploaded an image?  Done [2] Images can be found here
• Welcomed a user?  Done Did that just this morning! [3]
• Mediated or otherwise acted as a neutral party in a dispute?  Done
• Participated in discussion at WP:AN or WP:ANI?
• Taken a look at Wikipedia philosophies? Which philosophies do you hold to?
• Joined a WikiProject?  Done Member of several Wikiprojects as you can see by my userboxes [4]
• Written a DYK, GA, or FA?  Done David L Cook and Ft. Lauderdale articles are both GA
• Expanded a stub or otherwise cleaned up an article?  Done

Questions

Sorry I haven't been so active in updating. Here's a set of questions commonly found on RFAs.

• What's the difference between a ban and a block? Under what circumstances should they be used?

Blocking is done by an administrators to prevent a specific account from editing Wikipedia.

This is usually for editors who use vandalism or need to be acknowledged for wrong behavior. It also usually has a time expiration associated with it.

Banning is a formal revocation of editing privileges on all or part of Wikipedia.

This is an action that is taken when a specific editor refuses to listen and acknowledge wrong doing therefore continuing to engage in activity that is not appropriate. This action can be used for a blatant disregard for wikipedia policy.

• What is your view on administrator recall?

This seems to very a very hot topic! I don't know that I have an opinion one way or another. I think that if I am doing my job correctly as an administrator and not abusing the gifts I have been given, then I would have no problem in putting myself up for such a recall. However, if it turns into a witch hunt, I think that would be foolish for one to participate in such actions that will take away from what we are supposed to be here for to start with. So, I think it has it's place in when it comes to the issue of checks and balances.

• Let's say an administrator removes a chunk of information from an article you've been working on, citing BLP concerns, but you feel that it doesn't violate BLP policy. What would you do?

You need to have a conversation with the admin who removed the material to find out why he felt that it violated WP:BLP. This should take place on the talk pages and should remain civil at all times. At some point if you see that you are not seeing eye to eye on the matter, then you may want to solicit for other editors or another administrator to come in a mediate the situation. Through the whole process I feel you should keep your head about you and remain calm. You may just nd up learning something new and find a better way to deal with the situation. This in turn might help you when trying to help other editors.

Reply

I'm glad you asked me about recall. Basically, the reason it was so blown up was because the criteria is arbitrary. If you'll notice on Wikipedia:Administrators open to recall/Admin criteria, every admin basically has different criteria. Some create their own criteria, others go with Lar's, other with EVula, and basically there's no one policy. This category had existed for some time, but no one really gave it much thought until RFA questions came about placing one's self on CAT:RECALL. As a result, there was further recognition of recall until eventually, it was listed on WP:UCFD. It was that event that sparked a massive drama-fest on the issue of recall. Personally, I think recall and accountability is something inherent in the right of users. If an admin seriously hurts the encyclopedia, other have the right to call for desysopping, and each admin has a right to accountability. It's just because of the arbitrariness of the process that has left some doubt upon this.

Regarding your replies, they were good, but a few problems arise.

• Vandals are not to be "acknowledged," rather, we should WP:DENY them. Vandals are to be suppressed and kept from harming the encyclopedia.
• Banning isn't so much about blatant disregard for policy as it is about disruption. There are some users out there that seriously harm the encyclopedia through disruption, such as POV pushers and trolls. Banning is essentially IAR invoked to stop another user from hurting the encyclopedia.

Well, I tried to put it in my own words without the use of word to word copying like I see many other candidates do! lol. So, I should not use the word vandalism or acknowledge it but instead refer to it as a WP:DENY of usage? Banning should be used to stop the hurting of the encyclopedia? I just want to make sure I get my terminologies correct.

One of the qualities that should make up an administrator is open-mindedness. When one can think in a different way, great things can be accomplished. It is those who think and are bold that we have great things here. I don't want to sound overly philosophical, but I like to ponder upon the koans in WP:ZEN to help keep an open, calm state of mind. Try it and see. They have some great questions to think upon.

There are some real pearls of wisdom here! Canyouhearmenow 12:42, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

What did you think of my other answers?

I like how you use KISS in your answers. Better simple than long winded most of the time. bibliomaniac15 00:49, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Potpourri

• What are your personal criteria for an admin candidate?

Well, I think that the criteria that I have for an admin is simple. I feel if you are an administrator you should be willing to help teach those who are not as knowledgable as yourself. You are supposed to be a leader of sorts and having been given this gift by the community you should be giving something back. Not allowing power to go to your head because you tote the title of administrator is very important. I just voted against an RFA candidate today because of their rude approach at editing and dealing with other editors. Finally, I feel that an administrator should have a good background in creating articles and continuing on with those articles until they become respected pieces of work.

• What do you believe are your weaknesses? If you were made an admin, what would you need to read up on? What tasks do you believe you would totally avoid?

I think my weakness would be in the area of WP:Images and fair usage. I am not a person who understands how that works. If I were an admin, I would certainly have to study on that very issue. I have added photos and have come up against editors who deleted my images and I would have to go and try to figure out why they did it. Again, no one really gives a clear reason of why they do anything. I want to make sure if I am an admin that I try to make people understand why I make a decision or take an action. I don't know that there would be a task I would try to avoid. If I am unaware of what it means or takes to do a certain task, I will certainly be contacting you for some guidance! But I am a daredevil of sorts and will try anything once!

• Why is wheelwarring a bad thing, and how can you prevent it?

I am not sure what this is, but it does not sound nice! So, if I don't know what it is, I will certainly stay away from it! LOL Maybe it would be a better question to ask me if I know what it is? LOL

ok, nevermind. I found it. Well, I think this would be an aweful situation to be in. I think however that if you get into a situation like this, you would want to stay civil and try to talk it out. I don't think one should take a position of "Mine is bigger than yours!" If you cannot see a way to get out of it and you are getting nowhere with the others involved, then you would have no other choice but to take it to a noticeboard or to someone higher than yourself or the other editors involved. Maybe sometimes it is better to just walk away as well if it is not going to cause you continued problems. Canyouhearmenow 01:58, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Since you aren't too familiar with wheel warring, it would be good for you to read some examples. The Daniel Brandt wheel war, pedophilia userbox wheel war, and userbox wheel war are all good examples of what not to do. If you read an arbitration request, be sure to look at the evidence subpage to fully understand the context. bibliomaniac15 23:38, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Another set

• If you could change one policy without fear of opposition or reversion, what would it be?

This is an easy question for me! The one policy I would change would be the rules for notability on porn stars. It seems right now all that they have to do to have an article published on wikipedia is to have won an award. That is the only thing they have to do! With this, we have many non notable people who are qualifying for an article and they truly are not worthy of one. The policy also reads that they are allowed to cite theri own personal web pages and adverts which are xxx rated and will take the readers to pages that either promote their escort services or where you can buy their pronographic materials. I feel this is dangerous because young people are allowed to find this stuff and enter without parental supervision. One would not expect their child to be able to find adult material such as porn on an encyclopedia. So, in saying that, I would want to revamp the pornography policy to exclude those items and enforce stricter guidelines for inclusion.

• How do you apply IAR to your contributions? How would you if you were made an administrator? bibliomaniac15 23:12, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

I am not really sure I understand the bottom part of this question, but the first part is that even thought the Ignore All Rules policy is there and common sense should ring true, I still try my best to research the policy and proper editing style for what I am working on. I personally try not to ignore the rules this way I do not find myself in an edit war. If I were an administrator, I would have to realize that IAR rule is there and try to help educate people who are less knowledgable than myself in the proper ways to edit. I would try to take a firm, yet understanding hand to those editors who are using their best judgements in an editing situation. I mean after all, this is the way we learn. I hope I answered the question correctly.

Remember, these questions ask for your interpretations, so there's no one right answer. That said, I agree with your opinion on the first question, though I think it is worded to be against the fact that Wikipedia is not censored. We have many inappropriate images and such illustrating articles such as List of sex positions. So yes, inappropriate materials do exist, but personal web pages should of course not be cited.

Secondly, I'd like to talk to you about the meaning of IAR. IAR seems very hard at first. Since we're so used to the outside world and law where it is "Do this" or "Don't do this" and "Don't break the law," it seems hard that Wikipedia actually encourages breaking the rules. Really, what IAR is is that if one of our rules prevents you from making this encyclopedia a better place, then just ignore the rules and go ahead. One of the more popular corollaries of IAR is WP:SNOW. Say we have an AFD where the subject is obviously not notable. By WP:SNOW, we can say that there's no way such an article can fit in Wikipedia, let's do away with it. Non-admin closings of SNOW AFD's are an example of IAR, for example. So WP:IAR is actually not brazen lawbreaking but a vital extension of WP:BOLD.

The master of IAR appears to be the J-man himself, half of the reason because he pushed this into policy with the first Wikipedians and because he can do certain things with impunity that normal users would be very hard-pressed to do. Emergency desysoppings, blockings, and protection without consensus is a use of IAR, however controversial. Even NPOV is waived by IAR for some articles, the best example of which is probably Criticism of Holocaust denial. These uses of IAR are much, much more controversial than ones we normally use, and should only be done on extreme circumstances. So start thinking about how you use IAR. I'd like to see examples of you from ways you and I use IAR. bibliomaniac15 00:21, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Editing patterns

I'd like to know what your editing patterns are. Do you check your watchlist first, or do you head for Recent Changes first? Where do you tend to put effort, both in mainspace and in wiki-space? If we can identify how you edit, it would be easier to see what your strengths are and where you need improvement. bibliomaniac15 01:13, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

I always go straight to my watchlist to patrol what has been done. I check over everything there and then I may head to recent changes. I have been doing some recent changes, but I have also found myself reading and editing articles as well. Especially on the WP:AfD. I have been participating in that a litle more these days. Wanting to know what it is about, I always go and read and research the articles to make a judgement call for the deletion. If you look at my contributions, you will see I have chimmed in a some of these debates. I think I find myself more on mainspace moreso than wiki-space. Canyouhearmenow 01:26, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

By the way, right now is a very rare but cool chance to check out the WP:RFBs. A bureaucrat has the ability to make users admins or crats, grant and revoke bot status, and rename user accounts. Since the success rate for an RFB is 90% or above, it is a much bigger challenge than RFA. I suggest that you go over and take a look at the candidates. bibliomaniac15 01:35, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

I am unsure as what this means for me? Are you saying I need to go here to become an admin, or just to read about the process? Would you not need a nomination for this as well? I have had no one ask me if I would even like to be an admin! LOL Canyouhearmenow 01:41, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Oh, no. I was just asking you to check out the nominations and maybe lend support/oppose/neutral. If you don't want to, then it's fine with me. bibliomaniac15 02:10, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

ok, ok... I got it now. I will mossey over there and give a little look around. Thanks for clearing that up for me. Canyouhearmenow 02:36, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Wow, these nominations for RFB are a whole lot more reading. I just casted a vote for one of them and the history is very impressive. I felt comfortable casting a vote for that one. A lot of acknowledgement from the community. I can't even get a shout out! LOL. Just kidding. It is an interesting place to say the least. What is my next assignment shoudl I choose to take it? Canyouhearmenow 14:40, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

By the way, I think you have enough experience to be given rollback. Would you like it? bibliomaniac15 19:56, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for offering me rollback, but I have had it for a long time now. CBD gave it to me when it was first available to regular editors. I appreciate your trust in me though to offer it to me. I like it a whole lot better than WP:Twinkle.

What-if scenarios

• How would you deal with an extreme POV-pusher who has not committed any vandalism?

After reverting their edits. I would go to their talk page and engage in a conversation with them that would outline WP:POV. I would also probably show them an example of what pov was and how they could rewrite it to reduce this kind of conflict in the future. If this does not work and they continue to push pov, then I would bring in another editor to give some feedback. If that didn't work I would think that the only other choice would be to warn them of a block. If all else fails, Block.

• An administrator speedy deleted an article under G11. Later, you notice that an anonymous user has recreated the article. Should you delete the article under G1, G4, both, or do something else?

I have actually raqn into this situation and here is how I would handle it. First, I would go to the deleted article and look to see if in fact it deserved to be deleted under G11. If the article did in fact deserve deletion then I would review the new editors article to see if it was not up to par and deserving of another deletion. If the article is up to par and can qualify itself as a noteworthy article, then all is fine. I am a person who believes there is always two sides to an arguement. I like to review and step back to review the facts before making a hasty decision. I have learned in the entertainment industry that not everything is so clear cut. Same as this question.

• Do you think banned editors should be given a chance at a different language Wikipedia or sister project to redeem themselves?

I do not personally feel that a banned editor should be able to go to a different wikipedia format to redeem themselves. If they wanted to redeem themselves, they should contact the admin who banned them and start a civil conversation with that admin about rehabilitation. Let that admin get to know them and see that they have mended their evil ways. Otherwise, all we are doing is allowing them to spread poison onto another site. We are responsible for who we allow to edit and the behavior they display should be dealt with unilaterally.

• When should you decline a request at WP:AIV?

You should decline a request if the offender has not been properly informed of their abuses by tagging their talk page. You should deny a request if the offender is not currently vandalizing or active.

• A user requests semi-protection of an article, but you fully protect it. Why?

I would go back and look at the vandalism history on the article and decide if a semi protection would suffice. If the article is being constantly bombarded with vandalism I would go ahead and fully protect it because a semi protection would not work.

You are very into discussing which is very good. Admin discussion can be found at WP:AN or WP:ANI, for future reference. The only thing I disagree with is the last one. Full protection excludes all non-sysops from editing a page. Full protection due to vandalism is very rare and shouldn't be used for more than 3 days or so, because it prevents the article from developing. More plausible scenarios include if the user is deliberately trying to exclude an IP from editing due to an editing conflict. bibliomaniac15 I see no changes 22:21, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

So this would all be based on an IP address verses a user name? I guess that is where I am getting alittle confused with this question. I know that you cannot block out an IP address due to the amount of users who may be associated with it. But what about a registered user? Canyouhearmenow 22:37, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

It could be anybody versus anybody. You need to be attentive when protecting that the user is actually not trying to prevent others from editing in a content dispute. Either it's all or nothing. IP addresses can be prevented from editing in semi's, and non-admins can be prevented by full protection. Both can be blocked. bibliomaniac15 I see no changes 23:27, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate you teaching me this..Canyouhearmenow 01:02, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

End?

I feel fairly confident that you are ready to move on from this and apply what you have learned. I'm still not fully convinced you are very versed in the inner workings, so I would advise you to wait for an RFA. In the meanwhile, you should do or continue to do these things:

• Continue to work on articles. You are industrious and dedicated, and that's a quality an administrator really needs.
• Contribute to the Wikipedia space as well. Try something like WP:XFD or WP:RFA. In this way, you can gain more experience on what an administrator does and why they do it. You should also keep up with discussion on WP:AN and WP:ANI to see the nitty-gritty stuff.
• Work on the sidelines. You might want to try something like speedy deletion and vandal fighting. Knowing your personality and habits, I would suggest you to go more easily on dispute mediation. Don't dive into the big disputes, they can get very nasty. You might want to go with something informal and less serious like WP:3O.
• Remember to be prompt to the queries and concerns of others, to be civil to all users and give them a fair chance (but to be firm when the events call for it), to readily admit your mistakes, and to not get discouraged. Those are the big four qualities for an administrator.

Remember, I'm here to help and answer your questions as promptly as possible. Thank you, Canyouhearmenow, for giving me a pleasant admin coaching experience with you. I will be monitoring you, and when I feel you are ready, we'll see how well you can run the gauntlet. Cheers, bibliomaniac15 21:48, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Biblomaniac, I appreciate everything you have helped me with. The "Inner Workings" that you are talkign about, are these the things that you have pointed out in the body of your outline here? If not, could you please link me to where you think I really need the most help? I cannot begin to tell you what a pleasant experience this has been for me to deal with you! If I can ever help you, all you have to do is ask and I will be there! Please do not just leave me. If you can keep an eye on me to make sure I am not straying from the straight and narrow I would certainly appreciate it. When you feel I am ready, I would appreciate you giving me my push into an RfA. After all, I have become your monster!! LOL Canyouhearmenow 01:37, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Of course I'll be keeping an eye on you. Yes, the inner workings were the things I suggested you participate in. RFA, AFD, and speedy deletions are the best spot for you. I'll create a nom for you when I feel you're ready. I would also suggest that you regularly read RFAs and see what questions are appearing. If you know what to say before the question is asked, you'll be absolutely ready. You're one of my most active admin coachees, and I really like the fact that you ask questions whenever you need help. To me, that's really a quality that makes a great user. bibliomaniac15 03:21, 14 March 2008 (UTC)