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January 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for bureaucratship that did not succeed. Please do not modify it.

Adambro (Bureaucrat)

I was just prompted to look around for a bureaucrat to contact and noticed that we could perhaps do with some more bureaucrats. Of the four bureaucrats currently listed as active on this page we have Brian who has stated he is unlikely to be active for 6 months to a year, IlyaHaykinson who isn't terribly active, and Chiacomo who whilst has been reasonably active as late has a contributions history with large breaks. Also, of the three active bureaucrats listed as active (excluding Brian), all seem to reside in North America which means they are likely to be active at similar times of the day so any issues might not be dealt with as promptly as if we had a better spread of bureaucrats across timezones. On this basis, I consider my request to become a bureaucrat is justified and appropriate.

Whilst I have been editing Wikinews for a relatively short length of time since joining in early/mid 2007, I feel I quickly became a useful contributor and since becoming an administrator I think it would be reasonable to suggest that I'm amongst the more active admins. I'm also an admin on Wikimedia Commons and the English Wikipedia, and an OTRS volunteer, which has been useful both in terms of the experience it has given me and practically in dealing with issues which cross between the WMF projects. Whilst I've had numerous disagreements, I have at all times remained civil, and I'd suggest that not being afraid to speak up where I have concerns is a good characteristic of any user.

I have a good knowledge of the operation of bots on WMF projects and operate AdambroBot to update the weather map every hour which I think puts me in a good position to, if I become a bureaucrat, review requests for bot flags.

I'd invite everyone to assess my request and welcome comments or questions. Thank you for your time. Adambro 19:44, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

  • You claim that it would be better to have an even spread of B'crats across time zones to provide a prompt response, what would this be to as theres is rarely anything that requires quick responses from b'crats. (i'm stuggling to think of anything)
  • Why do you feel that your contribution to other project (such as commons etc) has any relevance here?
    • Do you feel that these contributions should be considered to show relation to this project with respect to your low (comparitive) edit count and time spent here?

--MarkTalk to me 10:14, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • On your first point, I would accept that there is unlikely to be the same urgency to deal with any issues as there would be in respect of admin rights but I still feel it is in the interests of the community that our bureaucrats are, not only in different time zones to enable requests to receive a more timely response, but also to better reflect the mix of different cultures from which the Wikinews community draws its contributors.
  • With reference to your second question, I feel very strongly that experience gained on other WMF projects is beneficial to me and the community and also feel that this should be taken into consideration with respect to my relatively short length of time participating in this project. When I started contributing here, I was already very familiar with how WMF projects work and their common policies, and as a result was able to quickly establish myself on the project needing only to take time to understand the variations in policies and the unique aspects of the Wikinews project whereby it differs from other WMF projects. Adambro 17:30, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments and votes

  • Neutral. I agree that we need another active Bureaucrat for when User:Brian is less active, and possibly someone from another time zone. I think you have an excellent admin record, your contributions have been valuable and copious and your adminship on other wikis and your OTRS work are a real plus. However, I feel that there are more suitable candidates on the site who are still very active but have been around for a lot longer. The only thing holding me back is that I feel that you are still relatively new for Bureaucratship; I would personally expect something like 2 years of experience. --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 22:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral. Same reason as Steven, no reasons to oppose, just too new. Thunderhead - (talk - email - contributions) 22:58, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment As I've noted, I appreciate I haven't been active here for terribly long but I've been involved in WMF projects since mid 2004 which I feel makes up for this. I may be relatively new here but I've been able to rapidly turn myself into a valuable contributor because of my familiarity with WMF projects, their policies and their conventions. Adambro 23:05, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral. Nothing against your qualifications, Adambro, but I feel that for this position there are some longer-tenured admins that I would like to see given consideration. --Jcart1534 01:36, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Appears to have strongly held opinions on process. Plus bureaucrats do almost nothing, they don't need to be active. Nyarlathotep 11:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Nyarlathotep, can you explain what you mean by "strongly held opinions on process"? What opinions might he have? Can you show us examples of what you mean? --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 12:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I'd also invite Nyarlathotep to clarify his point. Of course I have opinions but before I express an opinion I make sure that I'll be prepared to stand by it. Are bureaucrats expected to have no opinions or immediately withdraw their opinion when any opposition to that is made? I don't consider having strong opinions a bad thing but more importantly, I don't believe I've ever let my opinions negative impact on my actions as an admin. Adambro 12:45, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose —FellowWiki Newsie 18:14, 19 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose It's not a bad thing that potential bureaucrats have strong opinions. It is, however, a bad thing when said potential bureaucrat can be seen as combative when expressing those opinions. So, for me? I'm good, but thanks. TheCustomOfLife 04:53, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Okay, fair enough. I appreciate that this request is going to fail anyway now but I would like to make the most constructive use of the comments I've received. In particular, I'd ask TheCustomOfLife to expand on his point that I could be seen as combative in my approach to some discussions, could you point to some examples where I should have taken a different approach. Adambro 07:24, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose There is a world of difference between having a strongly held opinion which you assert and having a strongly held opinion which you use as a basis for persuading other users to see an issue from your side. I don't expect Adambro would have misused the buttons, but the community has shown little eagerness to give him the dust-buster as well as the mop. --Brian McNeil / talk 16:37, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Could you explain what you mean by your first sentence, I don't understand. Thanks. Adambro 17:56, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I mean what I say, although to put it more bluntly I could say you stake out a position then invite others to challenge it. This is a somewhat confrontational approach although I can understand it might not seem so when you are confident of the foundations for your belief. --Brian McNeil / talk 18:00, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for bureaucratship. Please do not modify it.

Brianmc (Bureaucrat)

Brianmc has been an active user on Wikinews for just over three years and in that time has racked up over 19000 edits. He is an admin, accredited user with oversight, check user and a member of the Arb Com. He has also shown utter dedication to the project with many hours spent around the project, on IRC, going to places to represent wn and also wikinewsie.org. he also never seems to sleep and therefore is pretty much around all the time but really all this doesn't matter, Brian doesn't need this rubbish intro, he talks for himself :-) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 17:33, 21 January 2008

  • Accepting nomination, there's little B'Crat-specific work although finishing cleaning out the de-admin would be nice. If people ask me to close off things like Admin votes I'll get to them as soon as I can. Despite Markie's checking in IRC and alleging I'm a robot almost good enough to pass the Turing test I think my warped sense of humour proves that wrong.
If I had to say what I thought was the worst Admin action I've taken in the last six months-year it would be blocking our Scientologist friend Misou who any admin without WN:CU privs can probably guess with reasonable certainty edited from axiom28.scientology.net without being logged in. Google "Axiom 28" and you'll see it is their propoganda wing. I regret this because (a) The Clams will hide and (b) There was a &*@% of a lot more troll-baiting mileage in that user. --Brian McNeil / talk 17:43, 21 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

Even if they could I wouldn't de-admin without community consensus and we don't seem to be reaching that on the vote I started about Eloquence. --Brian McNeil / talk 14:41, 25 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

I'm not going anywhere soon, unless I vanish off the face of the planet totally. :-) I'm almost embarrassed at the support this has garnered - and nobody has grilled me on it. I am open to questions in this section - I think we can do better than presidential debates and learn more about candidates for positions. --Brian McNeil / talk 00:38, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I'll toss one across the plate for you. If you had to choose between Sheik Yerbouti and Joe's Garage, which would it be and why? --Jcart1534 00:44, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That is probably the hardest question I'll get thrown at me... I'd chose the Joe's Garage option because I have more chance of convincing aspiring musicians to try it. --Brian McNeil / talk 00:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<sarcasm> Ok, I got a really hard question that is way better than any of the presidential debate questions, well here it is: What is the answer to life? —FellowWiki Newsie 00:42, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There is no answer to life, there is an answer to "life the universe and everything" - which is 42. Pretty pointless if you don't know more of the specifics about the question. --Brian McNeil / talk 00:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm Brianmc, not Deep Thought --Brian McNeil / talk 22:31, 27 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Worth a try... Blood Red Sandman (Talk) (Contribs) 07:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate talk page. No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for de-adminship , no consensus - Keep privileges. Please do not modify it.

User:Eloquence

Policy basis

No longer active. Last edit was August 10, 2007. Last main namespace edit, June 11, 2007. Last admin action: 28 June 2007.

Introduction to reasoning

Erik's userpage hasn't been updated to reflect the fact that he has left the board for employment on the WMF staff. This - in and of itself - isn't reason to de-admin - but I can see no possibility of him being in a position to make significant contributions or patrolling activity to exercise his Admin or B'Crat powers. With his position in the Foundation he can at any time tell Brion to give him these rights back and as such, and with some of our recent coverage of WMF issues, I would prefer that be the way it is - a two person process.

I have not contacted Erik regarding this. I am of the opinion that if he promptly responds and wants to argue a case it should be a test of our inactive guidelines. (Eg do we count people who keep track of what's going on as inactive?) If I am requested to contact him I will, I have his Foundation email address. I would, at such a point, also ask the Chair to become involved and Sue Gardner - perhaps with a view to having a specific resolution on administrative involvement in the Wikinews project by staff and board. There is indeed a serious issue of COI (please help make this policy) around this and I have tried to see how we can get guidelines for us creating content, and the people making it possible for us to do it here, to set ground rules. --Brian McNeil / talk —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Brian McNeil (talk • contribs) 18:16, 22 January 2008‎

Comments
  • Erik has not contributed to the community for almost a year. He has made no attempt to get involved with us or our projects on WN. It seems, in all fairness, that Erik has abandoned Wikinews IMHO. So regardless of being founder of Wikinews, he should have been given the same treatment, at the same time as the users above. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 22:28, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    What do you consider is different with the cases above where the period of inactivity is much greater but you've not supported yet you support this request? Adambro 22:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Nothing...if you want to do this based on inactivity, he should have been up here with the rest. Either way it does not change the fact that he is non-representative of this community. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 02:03, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I'd note that I didn't list everyone who I'd say is inactive and should have their admin rights removed, that would be a long list, rather a selection of those who are at the most extreme end that I thought would be the least controversial to gauge community feeling towards my feeling that users should use or loose these rights. Eloquence fell outside this. Adambro 06:07, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Although I understand why you'd rather not link it to his position, I think he deserves special consideration because of his position for the board as founder (position in wmf is another matter, which i don't have a good opinion on). CoI doesn't really work, because i'm sure theres areas where others have conflicts of intresets, and they just don't edit those articles (as well mindspillage is an admin, and has equal conflicts). If I was basing my vote on if he was inactive, I would say remove. Bawolff ☺☻ 22:36, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am afraid I do not understand the reasons for not contacting User:Eloquence. Do you think Erik will object and raise hell? If so won't he be even angrier if he were to discover it was done without his knowledge? That said, Erik seems to be the type that gladly acquiesce with a de-adminship, given his new position. I'd see this as only a COI issue since the inactivity is far shorter than many others (and six months is not almost a year). --SVTCobra 00:54, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • i don't see much of a COI issue with adminship, which is supposed to confer no extra editorial influence. admin actions are publicly logged and can be reviewed in full by any other administrator. to my knowledge, there's been no suggestion that Eloquence's admin actions has raised COI concerns and i certainly don't see a need for a "pre-emptive" removal of admin status. –Doldrums(talk) 08:45, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Per some of the comments here I have emailed Erik (CC Sue Gardner/Florence Devouard). Links to this section here and WN:COI were provided. IIRC This isn't the first time I've asked for input on WN:COI. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:27, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Quick comments:

  • Do whatever you think is best; my feelings won't be hurt. :-)
  • I'd advise you to read up a bit about the meaning of conflicts of interests in non-profits; there are a lot of misunderstandings regarding what a COI is and isn't in our community.
  • Whether on Wikinews or elsewhere, I've never believed in de-adminning people for inactivity; I think labeling inactive admins is generally sufficient, unless there's reason to believe that their accounts might be compromised or they might actively do damage. It's just process overhead with little obvious benefit and potential downsides (i.e., you reduce the number of people you could reach out to if you had to).

--Eloquence 21:01, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd be happy to withdraw the RfDA if you want to stand for reconfirmation. That would be less controversial. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:02, 24 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Votes

Note: {{support}} means you support removal of the candidates privileges. Keep comments in this section brief and use the above section. It is intended for discussion prior to people casting votes.

  • Oppose I don't buy your COI argument for numerous reasons. Btw, doesn't the COI argument violate your comment? Anyway people should vote how they like for their own reasons. If those reasons don't convince others to vote accordingly, fine. fyi, not contacting seems like a general violation of etiquette. <shrug>  :) Nyarlathotep 20:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC) ps, Once upon a time we tried not to be the source for news *about* wikipedia, not that this view was ever used constructively, but its a historical point.[reply]
Can you strike and subsequently remove your comment to move to the comments section? I would like to carry on a discussion on this but you offer insufficient information to do so. --Brian McNeil / talk 22:22, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

ArchiveBot (Temporary Bot Admin)

In order to carry out the automatic archival of the ~3000 articles per recent discussion on WN:AAA, this bot needs the admin flag. This will be a temporary adminship - I do not expect the job to last any longer than 1 month. The alternative to adminising the bot is to use my user account for the process - which is *highly* undesirable as it will flood RC with the changes made, and ArchiveBot already has a bot flag. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Skenmy (talk • contribs) 18:35, 25 January 2008‎

Questions / Comments

Votes

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate talk page. No further edits should be made to this page.

February 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

Anonymous101

I have decided to nominate myself for an admin as I want to help archive old articles and help fight vandalism on Wikinews. I have started about 50 articles in the three and a half months I have been at Wikinews and am quite familiar with Wikinews. If the community think I should not become an admin I will withdraw my request as there is no point in keeping a vote open if the community don’t want me to become an admin--Anonymous101 14:55, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions / Comments

  • What happened to the motivation behind your comment on your user page: "Just to make this clear, I have no interest in becoming an admin."? --Skenmy(t•c•w) 15:20, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • When I wrote that I was new to Wikinews and I had no interest in taking an active role in it. Since then I have started to take more of a active role and have decided I would be able to help in archiving articles, for which there is an incredible backlog. When I wrote I did have no interest in becoming an admin but since I have enjoyed Wikinews and have had looked at lots of articles and thought that it is 6 months old and needs archiving. So I have changed my mind as I think that by becoming an admin I cound help Wikinews. Also, at the time of writing that I did not fully understand Wikinews policy so I did not think it would be a good idea for me to become an admin. I now understand Wikinews policy, and as a result I am now less likely to make a mistake. --Anonymous101 16:34, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Before you note you may wish to take a look at my list of pages that may help you choose which way. to vote Also remember that voting is evil, but that you should Ignore all rules. . (Actually voting is evil isn't a rule so isn't covered by ignore all rules). --Anonymous101 Talk RfA 17:09, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

Question: If you could have a recurring feature on Wikinews, what would it be?
Question: Wikinews is currently faced with some important issues about how to remain true to its policies while increasing readership and experimenting with content. Do you plan to participate in the discussion about these news directions? --David Shankbone - (talk) 16:25, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

'Answer:I know this is not a new feature but I think the current obituaries feature is very good and should be made weekly. 'Answer: If I became an admin I would not use my position as an excuse to push may opinion further than that of a usual user, although I would take part in the disscusion. My personal opinion on this is that Wikinews should diversify to include more content like your Israel report although I think any page which could be a POV or Editorial should be in a different namespace and should not appear on the main page (except for possibly a small box which is clearly separate from the usual articles and clearly marked editorials). I also think that only accredited reporters should be allowed to write editorials. This is to stop Wikinews becoming a site with blog like content --Anonymous101 Talk 20:38, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

--Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 22:31, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Answer to question 1: I will definately add myself to Admins open for recall. Anonymous101 Talk 06:31, 15 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Answer to question 2: This isn't a weakness that will change if I become an admin but my I think biggest weakness is my lack of imagination, which means I won't be the one to come up with this amazing new design or this radical new idea that will improve Wikinews. (On a side note - the new main page design is brilliant). --Anonymous101 Talk 15:38, 15 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate talk page. No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for de-adminship which resulted in admin rights being removed. Please do not modify it.

User:Simeon

Another de-adminship request for the community to consider. Here we have Simeon. Looking at his contribs, it appears he stopped editing in January 2006, made a couple of edits in July 2007, then returned briefly at the end of January this year when he has stated that "Having re-visited Wikinews briefly after a long hiatus... I will not be back again. Please delete my 'user' pages." [1] I think this is a strong signal that his admin rights should be removed. I'd also, whilst accepting it is a long time ago, would draw attention to his block log which is lengthy (over 50 entries) as a result of constantly unblocking himself in May 2005, getting into a block/unblock war with another admin. This behavior is very unacceptable and I'd suggest would make this user someone who it would be inappropriate to leave with admin rights. I will be notifying the user of this request via email and talk page. Adambro - (talk) 12:46, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

desysoping done. Darkoneko - (talk) 16:20, 7 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.


March 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for de-adminship which resulted in admin rights being removed. Please do not modify it.

User:The_bellman

G'day, a while back I was put up for deadministration (?) and said that I would like to try and get involved with wikinews again. However in doing this I underestimated how big a commitment doing Honours at university would be. Now that I have a better idea of what this year will hold for me, I am now pretty certain that I won't be getting involved again any time soon. So I would now support my de-admining. Cheers ~The bellman | Smile 10:51, 7 March 2008 (UTC).[reply]


desysoping done. Darkoneko - (talk) 16:20, 7 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

Planoneck

Hope it's not too arrogant of me, but I'ma go ahead and request adminship. I figure the worst that could happen is to be rejected and go back to doing the same stuff I've always been doing. Then maybe I can even improve myself and make my editing not suck as bad, so that I won't be rejected the next time.

The thing is, I'm more interested in creating articles than the technical stuff that admins usually do. But if I become an admin, I'll probably find myself doing more of the technical stuff, since I'll have access to more tools. Maybe I'll even find time to (gasp) participate in a community discussion!

So give me your honest opinion, and don't be afraid to tell me I suck. Believe me, I'm used to it. ;) ~Planoneck~ 02:20, 16 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions/Comments

  • Why do you need the tools? What admin tasks will you help with?
When I'm not writing articles, I usually watch recent changes, looking out for vandalism and the like. I can revert most vandalism, but sometimes it takes an admin a couple of minutes or longer to notice a vandal page and delete it. That's the kinda stuff I want to help out with. I might also be involved with archiving, if it happens to be a slow news day. Oh, and being able to make requested edits to protected articles would be pretty cool. ~Planoneck~ 00:29, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, I guess. Just in case I do suck as an admin. ~Planoneck~ 00:29, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • What do you think should be the minimum age for admins?
I don't think there should be a minimum age. If someone is trusted by other users and they have made good edits, their age shouldn't matter. Of course, I may be just a tiny bit biased... ;) ~Planoneck~ 00:29, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My greatest weakness would have to be my age. No matter how nerdy and wiki-oriented I may be, I'm still a teenager, and teenagers by definition do stupid things. Hopefully I won't do anything too stupid. My greatest strength is my life - or rather, my lack thereof. This means that I have a bunch of time to waste on wiki stuff. Expect this to change next year when I enter high school, and I have to suffer the self-imposed workload of too many Advanced Placement classes. I'll probably still find time to edit at 3:00 in the morning, though. Don't worry about me. ~Planoneck~ 00:29, 17 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

Markie

Markie is experienced and a regular contributer. I'm not going to write a long description because all of you have seen his excellent contributions. --Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) 17:08, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions/Comments

Do you accept this nomination? --Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) 17:08, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

of course :-) --MarkTalk to me 17:18, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Markie was previously an administrator who asked this his rights be removed[2], why was this the case and what is to say we're not going to find ourselves in this same position in the future? Adambro - (talk) 20:05, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

i requested the removal of my sysop flag after this event (the comments tab stuff). the reason i requested removal was because i felt that i had let the community down by doing something that had affected many users. the aftermath of this, shown on AAA, was not at all good, and further re-iterated the point to myself that what i had done was wrong. therefore i decided to ask for the permissions to be removed, kinda like a recall vote, but decided this on my own.
i would like to think that i have learnt from this, and in the future try to avoid making errors of judgements in the same way, such as editing things which will affect many users if i am not 101% sure i can fix any breakages. also i would like to think that i could, now i know the community more, accept the fact that i have broken/done something wrong and just move on from it. --MarkTalk to me 23:26, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What is the average wing velocity of an unladen swallow? --TUFKAAP - (talk) 10:09, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

hmmm, wikilinker says " Error with your calculation.", however we can conclude that you should navigate your way to http://www.style.org/unladenswallow/ for a very thorough answer :-p --MarkTalk to me 12:26, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

i was, remember?? :-p --MarkTalk to me 17:31, 18 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
heheh :-) --MarkTalk to me 16:32, 19 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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April 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

User:Cirt

Cirt has been a regular contributer with central months who has requested many actions at AAA. If he was an admin he could make those changes without having to ask at AAA. This would be helpful for things like preventing vandalism. His contributions have been excellent and he should be an admin. Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 19:04, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions/Comments

Do you accept this nomination? Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 19:04, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I accept. I know I focused on a particular topic when I started out here and was learning the ropes, but I have since attempted to diversify the type of articles I write, contributing to 10 articles on other unrelated topics. It has been quite fun collaborating with others in some of those areas, particularly recently on articles related to Africa, which is underrepresented in coverage in this project and that is an area I would like to continue to contribute to more often. Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) is correct - I often find myself making requests at WN:AAA and it would be nice to be able to help out the community and perform administrative actions without waiting for an administrator. I also would like to help out dealing with vandals, and archiving pages. I will strive to confer with other administrators in order to get some good guidance as a new administrator. Cirt - (talk) 19:20, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would also put myself in Category:Admins open to recall. Cirt - (talk) 21:21, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Will you participate in the efforts to archive articles? --SVTCobra 01:37, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I will participate in WN:ARCHIVE. Some of the articles that I have written/significantly contributed to are over a month old and have yet to be archived, so I am aware of the backlog issue. I have also noticed posts about this issue at WN:AAA, and I would love to be able to help out cut down on the backlog and archive articles older than Seven Days. Cirt - (talk) 01:47, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What are your strong points and weaknesses as an admin? --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 14:52, 12 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well in monitoring a bunch of articles I have dealt often with reverting vandals and reporting them to WN:AAA, so it would help to be able to semi-protect articles that are subject to active vandalism. As I said above, I would like to help out with WN:ARCHIVE and help clear the backlog with that. I have been participating and commenting in the WN:DR process, but I would certainly consult with one or two more experienced admins before jumping into that process and deleting articles myself, after a consensus to delete has been established. Cirt - (talk) 04:40, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
So you have no weakness? --SVTCobra 21:04, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, of course I do - I don't have a whole lot of experience in how to do deletion closures - that's why I said above I would consult with other more experienced administrators first, before closing items that have reached consensus at WN:DR. Cirt - (talk) 22:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
LOL, so your weakness is that you will consult with others to avoid making mistakes. That's OK. In a job interview I said that my weakness was that I was "too diligent". --SVTCobra 23:18, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well aside from inexperience in that area, with respect to article writing I don't have much experience setting up interviews - but I am actually in the process of working on that, for a Africa-story about healthcare delivery in Darfur. Cirt - (talk) 23:21, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  • Support as nom. (presuming Cirt accepts nom) Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 19:04, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral without insulting everyone and sugar coating this, I don't have a level of trust with his user. He himself states above that he came here with one thing in mind, and while, yes, he has diversified, I don't think enough time has passed to build a level of trust. I would gladly support in a couple of months, should Cirt continue on the road that he is on - as a good contributor. --Skenmy(t•c•w) 21:18, 8 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think he has managed to build a good level of trust and remember, as Jimbo said, Adminship should be no big deal. A101 - (talk) 08:30, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hes adding himself to admins open to recall so if he does start making major mistakes and abusing his power we can deadmin him, (However I doubt he will make major mistakes and abuse his power)A101 - (talk) 09:18, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I do not know what else to say in response to this above comment - other than that I have diversified my contributions - and that I will continue to contribute to/write/create articles on a wide variety of topics, both before and (hopefully) after I become an Admin. I think that the "Support" comments below by David Shankbone (talk · contribs) and SVTCobra (talk · contribs) are also helpful in illustrating/explaining this point. Cirt - (talk) 19:47, 10 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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User:Ryan524

Well as some of you may have known awhile ago I was verry active on Wikinews, I fought alot of vandalism and was an admin. There was at one point an issue that arose on Wikipedia at the conclusion of which I did leave for a decent amount of time >1 year, since I have come back again as I figured I most definatley would some day, though I can't promise the amount of activity I had before I took a wikibreak, I can check by daily, or at least almost daily, and I will continue to fight vandalism here, with or without community approval to be an admin again, it just makes things so much easier to be able to block the vandals myself I found. I do expect to be sticking around for some time and look foward to making Wikinews a bad wiki to vandalise.--RyanB88 - (talk) 01:59, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry it seems I logged in under a diffrent account, this account was the one I was an admin with, I created the other one when I forgot the password to this one which I have since remembered. Sorry for the confusion there.--Ryan524 - (talk) 02:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions / Comments

4, the answer to everything is 4. 1000000*1=One Million=Ten=Three=Five=Four=Four... see, lol. ;) On a serious note though if you want my honest views, I was created by God, for a purpose here on earth, well so was everyone else. Not thats it should matter but I am a born again Christian so my plan is to censor out any anti-christian material with my admin powers, well maybe not quite, I still respect others opinions even if they do call them facts and respect each persons freedom of speech, especially since some countries don't even have such a thing.--Ryan524 - (talk) 03:14, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, and would also help fulfil {{editprotected}} requests.--Ryan524 - (talk) 16:21, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Your total edit count, counting your past as well, is very low. In fact, I believe that if you are reinstated, you'd have the lowest edit count of any active Admin. Since your return, your have fairly few edits in "mainspace" and as of this writing only had one edit at all in the last three days. I'd like to see more of a commitment on your part, even though I respect the right-to-return. Your comment that your "plan is to censor out any anti-christian material with my admin powers, well maybe not quite" is disconcerting, even if made jokingly. Also, I suggest that you go to Wikinews:Changing username and get the User:RyanB88 account merged, before sockpuppetry is alleged. --SVTCobra 23:35, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votings

  • Support No objections. Thunderhead 02:50, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose It would be nice to see a reasonable level of contributions before granting admin rights again for a number of reasons. It is a while since you've last edited, I'd like to see that you still understand our policies and guidelines and are able to apply this appropriately. It would also be nice to be fairly confident that you're not simply going to disappear again and for this I'd need an impression of how you handle different situations. I'd like to see a period in which you can demonstrate your efforts to fight vandalism as can of course be done without the admin rights. I also note from looking through your contributions that you seem to contribute in bursts, making many edits in one day and then not editing for weeks. I'm not sure this is what we want from an admin. We surely want people who are keeping themselves familiar with Wikinews affairs and are around to explain their actions. It is great that you're back and I look forward to working with you but I think it is a little much to expect it is appropriate to step back into your previous admin role. Adambro - (talk) 05:28, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose currently, as Wikinews has probably changed a lot since 2006 --A101 - (talk) 05:59, 29 April 2008 (UTC) Support as I have now seen that he understand policy. A101 - (talk) 16:29, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment To address both your concerns, the fact is Wikinews actually hasn't changed that much since December of 06, its got more users, more artivles, but the underying principal is there, and alot of the main policies still exist saying mostly the same thing, I have been going over and reading over each and every policy to ensure I know what it is currently and I am finding that. To address the concern of just stepping back into a previsous admin role, officially it says here, "Former administrators who resigned their adminship in good standing may be reinstated at the discretion of any bureaucrat" I think thats this is exactly my case I resigned as admin as noted in the dif you linked to, I was not removed for doing anything wrong, but nonetheless I think the community should be behind me if I become an admin again. I hope this helps you understand the specifics of this situation and whatever the outcome I respect the decision of the community.--Ryan524 - (talk) 18:48, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I understand your reasoning but I would like to see you edit for about a month first. --A101 - (talk) 05:35, 30 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I am almost tempted to close this as a pass under the past admins may reply for status rule Brian | (Talk) | New Zealand Portal 15:19, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I'd suggest considering the opposition that would be inappropriate. I'm close to feeling that such actions would be inappropriate in all circumstances. Letting an RfA run and giving everyone a chance to raise any issues is hardly going to cause too much hassle or disruption, especially if the request is uncontroversial. I think in all instances like this we should have the opportunity to discuss it. If a user has previously disappeared and requested their rights be removed we should consider whether this is likely to happen again. It wouldn't be fair on our stewards for us to allow people to return and give them back their admin rights straight away for them to only disappear after a short while again, creating unnecessary work for the stewards. Adambro - (talk) 15:59, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I am aware of this rule but have specificallly chose to go though a community vote again because I personally feel it's important to have the backing of the community, which i'm glad to see their is not alot of opposition and this has served a purpose in giving Anonymous101 a chance to voice his concerns and I am glad to see his concerns have been delt with and he supports me, I do hope to aliviate Adambro's concerns as well. The only thing I can really say to Adambro though at this point it while I agree such would be unfair to stewards to have to keep removing admin rights for someone who keeps leaving their is hardly any history of such being a problem, leaving once is something that could hapen to anyone, between RL and my need for a wikibreak I just had to leave for an extended time, nothing else is comming up that would cause an extended leave to come up again which is why I am requesting to be reinstated as an admin. I hope this gives you some understanding into my situation Adambro, and the reasoning behind me going though the Rfa again Brian.--Ryan524 - (talk) 16:35, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support If the user is back, and is regularly contributing, I see no reason why a former admin, who was NOT de-admined for breaking policy etc, should not be an admin again. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 15:24, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, but weak oppose. In a couple of months, you'll got my vote :) Jacques Divol - (talk) 17:17, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I don't remember anything iffy from before. Nyarlathotep - (talk) 10:51, 8 May 2008 (UTC) This vote has been struck, as it was too late to be counted --MarkTalk to me 22:16, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]


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May 2008

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User:Submarine

Well im gunna put this user up for de-admining due to lack of use of the tools/inactivity. This one should be pretty simple IMO, as the user has NEVER used there tools, yes, 0 admin actions ever.--MarkTalk to me 17:45, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

also, this users last edit was just over a year ago. --MarkTalk to me 17:47, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

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User:Elliot K

This user has only used his admin tools 3 times, and last edited in Jan 07. --MarkTalk to me 17:50, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

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User:Cllewr

This one should be pretty simple also hopefully, as the user has NEVER used their tools, yes, 0 admin actions ever. They also last edited in October 07. --MarkTalk to me 17:53, 9 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

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User:Sfullenwider

This user has used their admin tools only 3 times, and also are inactive, with one edit in Jan 2007, and before that in Oct 06. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 17:57, 9 May 2008‎

Votes

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User:Crimson

User has only used admin tools 5 times, and last edited in Oct 07. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 18:04, 9 May 2008‎

Votes

Yet, you just moved yourself from the list of inactive admins, to active admins. Does that mean you are returning? --SVTCobra 00:36, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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User:Dan100

User last edited in July 2007, almost a year ago. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:21, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

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User:Frankie Roberto

User last edited in July 2007, almost a year ago. Also has only used the admin tools twice. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:21, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

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User:Mindspillage

Last edited in April 2007, over a year ago. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:21, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

Shes a her. Bawolff ☺☻ 22:38, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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User:NGerda

Had 4 edits in 2007 as a whole. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:21, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

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User:Pingswept

User had 3 edits in 2007 as a whole. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:28, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

If they are not being notified by email, then people should probably be voting no, like some did last time. Also, WN:IP does say that rfda'ed people should be notified by email. Well, the spirit of WN:IP is "Here is how to be polite about it." Nyarlathotep - (talk) 22:47, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As I understand it they've all been notified via their talk page and those with valid email addresses have been emailed but seriously what is the point? I keep questioning this but no one seems prepared to explain. For what purpose should we make efforts to contact them? "Run back to WN now and save you admin rights?" I don't think that is in the interests of the community and I don't think being polite really overrules this, clearly they're not active on Wikinews so I doubt they're going to be upset about their rights being removed and I would hope that any of our admins would be sensible enough not to expect Wikinews to be frozen in time when they leave. Adambro (talk) 08:38, 12 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That may be, but if so it would only be because of Daniel. It seems to me that the nominators both argued against it, so my assessment of the process is correct, imo. At the rate this purge has grown, I am not sure that Daniel got them all. Further, I just don't understand the purge. Why are we doing this? Have we ever had an inactive admin come back and abuse their privileges? --SVTCobra 00:18, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I disagree with WN:IP. -- IlyaHaykinson (talk) 07:33, 12 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Simply disagreeing with IP does not satisfactorily explain your opposition here IlyaHaykinson. IP proposes a certain way of handling inactive admins, the nomination of admins to have their rights removed is not automatically something to do with IP just because that proposed related policy exists. Please clarify your reasons for opposing these nominations. Adambro (talk) 08:38, 12 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In fact yes it does : It means I don't thing people should be deadmined for inactivity. Which is a reasonable point of view. Nyarlathotep (talk) 00:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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User:RossKoepke

User had 4 edits in 2007 as a whole. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:28, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

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User:Uncle G

Last edited Dec 2007. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Markie (talk • contribs) 16:28, 10 May 2008‎

Votes

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User:Jimbo Wales

User has never used the admin or bureaucrat rights he has on the project and considering the healthy number of admins we have I suspect he never will so doesn't need these rights anymore. Jimbo only edits extremely rarely here. Adambro - (talk) 19:59, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

Comment This user did not recieve adminship through normal processes. (I think Eloquence gave him the admin bit after he made a comment about mediawiki:Sitenotice, but don't quote me on that). Bawolff ☺☻ 22:36, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose removal of administrator rights, he often (on enwp) edits archives etc. to courtesy blank material per emails he recieves, and he may need that here. Better safe than sorry, really.
  • Support removing bureaucrat rights. Daniel (talk) 23:29, 10 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Comment His edit history here shows no use of admin rights and this perhaps suggests it is unlikely he'll ever use them in future. If he never had cause to use them when the community was smaller then I doubt he would now. Also, I'd hope that he'd think twice before doing so and instead leave such actions to our now much more established community. He's active over on enwp and so him having admin rights there is perhaps appropriate. Admin/b'crat rights are supposed to be practical tools, Jimbo having these rights instead seems to be symbolic now. Adambro - (talk) 11:03, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I tend to agree with Adambro here. --Brian McNeil / talk 11:42, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral per Adambro. --Skenmy(t•c•w) 12:21, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]


WikiNews rocks. Adminship is provided on the basis of necessity. It's a mop and bucket, not a badge of authority, as they say. This is great because it demonstrates a lack of favoritism. If Jimbo complains and gets sysop back, I'm going to have to eat my tongue, though. This comment by White Cat is incorrect:

Jimbo will restore his adminship when he feels like it. He exists above policy and guidelines.

☯  Zenwhat (talk) 15:31, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As does all board members. They will not hesitate to re-admin re-bcrat or re-oversight themselves should the need arises. They (Foundation) own the site and they make the rules. Just because they let us decide some issues on our own does not mean they do not reserve the right to interfere. The removal of their access is hence symbolic. -- Cat chi? 16:08, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, I do think you should not consider board members above the policies and guidelines. Anthere - (talk) 16:37, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Bravo! Anthere, you continue to prove why the community's trust was well placed in putting you on the board. --Brian McNeil / talk 19:23, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments made after de-adminship discussion was closed

Please comment at WN:AAA not here as the request is closed

Please comment at WN:AAA not here as the request is closed
Due to recent developments, I am here more often and anticipate being here more often. Please restore my admin rights. Also, please reconsider the policy of removing admin rights simply due to inactivity on this project, particularly as applied to people who are active throughout Wikimedia.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 04:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would have to respectfully disagree. I mean this is a very strong consensus. Although I don't see why there couldn't be a request made for re-adminship. The vote has been going on now since may 10, ten days ago. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 04:09, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with this comment made by TheCustomOfLife (talk · contribs) at WN:AAA, as well as comment by DragonFire1024 (talk · contribs). Over 10 days, 10 users commented with a sentiment one way or the other. 10 supported removal of bureaucrat rights, and 9 supported removal of sysop and bureaucrat rights, with 1 opposed to the removal of sysop rights. Jimbo Wales (talk · contribs) also never had an initial RfA on Wikinews. Cirt (talk) 04:31, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: As this de-adminship discussion was closed after 10 days, no further discussion should take place here. As Jimbo Wales (talk · contribs) has been desysopped after community consensus, the proper procedure according to process if the user wants to become an Administrator on Wikinews would be to have a new RfA discussion. Further discussion about this particular closed de-adminship discussion is taking place at WN:AAA. Cirt (talk) 04:36, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Closed per user withdrawl

User:Ryan524

Some of you were involved in my last Rfa, well 5 people were. It fialed due to so few votes, so I am back this time I am really working on getting people out to vote. The reason I want to be an administrator is alot of what I do here is basic matnience type stuff. Some of which I don't need to be an admin to do, but something require it. The biggest thing is archiving. There is such a backlog and it seems most the time admins are just archiving the new stuff but not dealing with the backlog so that's one thing I want to fix. I have been a wikinews user for years, was an admin at one time but stepped down before taking an extended wikibreak, now I am back and I see nothing in the forseeable future that would cause another extended wikibreak.-Ryan524 (talk) 23:06, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

CLAIRIFICATION: YES, a previous Rfa closed about a week ago had failed, but not from opposition but essetially a lack of overall votes anyway to make a consensus. Under normal circumstances I would not be back doing this but concidering the situation in which my previous one was closed I see no issue. I'm glad to see a turnout for voting here, and I will be letting the Rfa go. That said reguardless of its outcome, this Rfa is it, what the final outcome is, is it. So I ask that you set aside your feelings about another Rfa so soon and vote how you think I would do as an admin again. I ask that you take a honest evaluation. If you really feel you are in a sistuation where you do not "know me well enough" well than I extend an invitation o you to come on IRC, I am on there at least once a day (on weekdays) and we can chat.

The other thing that was brought up by Cirt was some actions after my last Rfa, honestly it seems some might take these actions the wrong way. I am also more than happy to discuss it in IRC. The consensus discussion IMO is an important discussion to get everybody on the same page, while it was the previous Rfa that got me thinking about it, I get the sense some of you came to the conclusion that I was trying to change my Rfa or something, but that is not what it was about. Also Cirt mentioned the AAA entries. IMHO its obvious, I found articles needing archiving and they wern't currently listed in the DL at the bottom of WN:ARCHIVE so I added them there so an admin knew. It was not intended to be any form of "Revenge" I could come up with a better revenge if I wanted to get revenge, come on.

Any other questions, comments, or concerns, feel free to ask here, or find me in IRC.--Ryan524 (talk) 14:00, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions / Comments

Votes

  • Neutral -- After his last RfA closed unsuccessfully, Ryan524 (talk · contribs) performed several actions which were not admirable, at least to me. He started a back and forth discussion about "consensus", which seemed to directly stem from his unsuccessful RfA. In addition, he flooded the Administrators' Alerts page with Archive requests, seemingly as a form of retaliation to create more work for Admins after his RfA was not successful. These are not traits we should have in our Admins. However, even given all this, if his behavior improves and he contributes positively for a couple months, I would most likely support an RfA in the future. I also think this one comes way too soon on the heels of the last one. I will provide Diffs, but have to run out at the moment, will be back later. Cirt (talk) 23:23, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see how discussing something is "not admirable" I think it was a useful discussion. And listing archiove requests is harldy a form of retaliation but simply noting some articles I found that needed archiving. Though I can see how you would think these things I just want to clairify.-Ryan524 (talk) 23:28, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you would like further clairification i'd be happy tochat about it with you on irc.--Ryan524 (talk) 00:22, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This comment was also troubling to me. [3] Cirt (talk) 00:45, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Changed to Neutral, Ryan524 has also been making some good contributions lately, but I am still a bit ambivalent, per above. Cirt (talk) 00:48, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Sorry Ryan, the issues Cirt mentions as well as your incredible desire to become an admin (wait a bit between RFAs :) ) leave me some what concerned and I can not support adminship at this time. --Cspurrier (talk) 01:13, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would not say I have an incredible desire to become an admin. If I did I would have just asked a b'crat for my adminship back per the now removed reinstatement ability. Normally I would wait but seeing how it was not failed because of opposition but because of lack of consensus IMO there is nothing wrong with re-rfaing now, it would have been diffrent it the majority of my votes were oppose.--Ryan524 (talk) 04:07, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
NOw don't get me wrong, I do want to help out archiving is a big need right now and I would be glad to server in that capacity but only if the community chooses to let me. Also what I siad to Cirt about the "issues" that goes for anyone because while I can see how you could come to that conclusion that would be a misinterpretation and I would be more than happy to help expalin that better so everyone is on the same page.--Ryan524 (talk) 04:10, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The issue has now become one where people appear to be opposing because they feel they are being badgered into granting the sysop bit. I know, meant to be "no big deal", but that's not the issue here. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:52, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the support Blood Red Sandman. I'm glad to have someone standing with me here, but don't worry I would bet money you won't be the only support.--Ryan524 (talk) 14:00, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose What is the urgent rush to be an admin again? Bombarding the community with RfA's isn't going to do you any favours. There was an opportunity when the previous request was closed effectively due to no consensus to reflect on what was said and build up a better working relationship with the community for a few weeks but this seems to have been missed. I don't that think you shouldn't be an administrator again, just not yet. Adambro (talk) 06:45, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose time between requests is unseemly. I suspect the best course of action would be to withdraw the request and forget about this for a time (longer than between this and the previous) then quietly find someone to nominate instead of a self-nom. --Brian McNeil / talk 07:56, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose as i said on your previous request, wait a couple of month or so and you'll get my vote, 2 weeks is too short. Best wait that someone else propose you as admin; i like this way Jacques Divol (talk) 09:37, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It appears I didn't realize Rfaing so soon would be such an issue, IMO it shouldn't be because its not Ilike most people opposed me, it was just not enough either way. But even with this I'm going to let this one run it's course and howeer it ends...well lit ends.--Ryan524 (talk) 13:22, 14 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for de-adminship which resulted in admin rights being removed. Please do not modify it.

User:Adambro

It is with disappointment and sadness that I feel this is necessary. Adambro has been difficult with other users as far as consensus goes, but words turned into actions with the most recent deletion debate over the Mormon copyright infringement article, and the leaked OTRS ticket that proved such an infringement did occur. Despite journalistic ethics allowing for fair reporting from within an organization, and no other voices coming to Adambro's aid (in fact, the overwhelming consensus is to keep the article), Adambro has vowed to fight on, consensus be damned, even going as far as to war with other admins to do it.

As always, Wikinews relies on contributors who can engage - sometimes spiritedly - in discussion, and it is "no big deal" to have adminship. Yet, there have been proposals in the past to have admins work to 1RR instead of 3RR. Adambro's actions go far beyond this with at least four reverts and a "fingers-in-ears-la-la-la" attitude to advice given by other administrators. Furthermore, he abused administrator rollback twice in reverting administrators, and in total reverted against three different administrators without discussing at all. I ask that the Wikinews community consider whether such behavior is compatible with being an administrator on this site.

I'd be more forgiving and forgetting if this were an isolated incident, but with Adambro's penchant of screeching dialogues to a halt, as well as disrupting Wikinews and article space at the detriment of other writers to "win his case," I feel he's really abused the trust of the community who voted for him to begin with.

His actions do not put Wikinews first. I'm sorry, but this had to be done. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mike Halterman (talk • contribs) 11:31, 15 May 2008‎

I would very much question much of TheCustomOfLife's comments in this nomination. I have not "vowed to fight on". I have made my position clear with regards to the article that material obtained in violation of WMF OTRS rules should not be included and I don't consider "it has been leaked" be be an adequate excuse considering it was us, as Wikinews, that made this information public. Daniel has insisted that I raise my suggestions that OTRS was misused with the Communications Committee and I have done so. I have been discussion on IRC about my recent actions and have accepted that I will not continue to remove the material and am instead awaiting to hear back from ComCom. I do, and will continue to, maintain that the inclusion of this material is inappropriate through appropriate channels and this does not make be unfit to be an admin.
I'd be very irresponsible if I didn't raise legitimate concerns where I feel necessary yet I am being made an outcast for doing so. This can be illustrated by Brianmc raising the issue of me querying his use of CheckUser at Dispute Resolution. Is it really so bad to dare to question Brian's actions? It appears so.
I'd debate whether my use of rollback in reverting the addition of the material from OTRS can really be classed as an abuse of my admin rights. Clicking "undo" instead of "rollback" would have pretty much the same result.
I do not and will not hesitate to question the actions of other editors and raise concerns about articles where I see fit. I fail to see how doing so has impacted negatively on our readers. Rather, it is part of our responsibility to our readers that we ensure that we address internal issues. Whatever I have done has always been done with the best intentions for improving the project and it is a great shame that it would appear that some users have taken a disliking to me for my opposition to some of the things they have done. If this results in the removal of my admin rights then that will be very disappointing but unless I'm banned from contributing then I'm not going to simply agree with anything that is said to keep people happy and will question editors however inconvenient it might be for them to justify or explain what they've done. It is in the interests of the project and our readers that I continue to do so. Adambro (talk) 12:04, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This drama does not belong here, it belongs in your response to my filing of a WN:DISPUTE. --Brian McNeil / talk 12:25, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Mike, it would be appropriate to sign a nomination for de-admin. Also, could you document with diffs where the reverts occurred or at least the page or article name. Thanks. --SVTCobra 14:17, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I signed under votes. I don't think it's that difficult to assume who filed the report since I said I was the nominator. The article in question is Wikimedia Foundation receives copyright infringement claim from Mormon Church. TheCustomOfLife (talk) 20:07, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  • Support as nom. TheCustomOfLife (talk) 11:31, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I am currently in dispute with this user. --Brian McNeil / talk 11:37, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Okay, seriously, I have no idea what any of this OTRS crap is, so I don't know if my vote has any weight, but I strongly oppose de-admining Adambro. He's doing what he thinks is best for Wikinews, even if the rest of you think he's wrong. (I'm starting to think he's wrong, but frankly I never cared much in the first place. Can we get back to writing articles instead of fighting over them, please?) Yeah, I guess we could do without the revert wars, but he naturally feels very strongly about this. Not that I support revert warring, but it's not something to get de-admined over. At least not until it becomes a severe problem, which I honestly don't think it has at this point. Removal of admin rights is a serious thing. It should not be done unless an admin is seriously harming Wikinews. So let's count the number of articles Adambro has disrupted/attempted to delete. I count 1. Now let's count the number of articles Adambro has created: 26. This is not counting the number of times he reverted vandals, protected pages, or otherwise cleaned up the site. He will not be able to do many of these things if he is no longer an admin. I have the feeling that he is being nominated for de-adminship because Wikinewsies consider him an annoyance, an obstacle, someone whose differing opinion always seems to get in the way. Wouldn't it be great if you could just get rid of things that annoy you? Oh wait, you can. This is Wikinews, where an angry mob of angry editors is given more respect than an administrator. The fact that everyone else disagrees with him does not give anyone the right to remove his admin privileges. If anything, THAT would amount to censorship (a word that is passed around too lightly these days). In b4 people proving me wrong. ~Planoneck~ 11:49, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support; what I saw today was unfortunately an exhibition well below the standards of decorum required to be an administrator. Suggestions that this is just an occasional thing are both without merit and irrelevant; administrators should be judged on all their actions, not just the 90% positive ones, and Adambro has a history of disrupting consensus-building through inappropriate means when participating in disputes. This was one of the worst examples I've seen in a while. He reverted on his lonesome, against expressed consensus, and continued to do so after being reverted with descriptive edit summaries and after suggestions to drop it and let the Communications Committee deal with it. Rather than following this, he continued to revert, this time using administrator rollback, and only stopped when told he would be blocked if he touched that article again. This episode shows two things: i) that Adambro's judgement is fatally flawed and not up to the stanard required; ii) that Adambro thinks and acts for himself and not for Wikinews and consensus of the community. It also strikes me as malicious payback against Brianmc after the CoS checkuser incident, a view not lessened when Adam said "I have a desire to pursue this beyond what has been said/done here on Wikinews". All-in-all, I do not believe Adambro has the consensus support of the community, as a result of ignoring them and going on an anti-consensus rampage of reverts and rollbacks for what has strong undertones of personal gain, as well as some sort of martyrdom against the current consensus forming at WN:DR against his passionate attempts to delete the article entirely. Sorry, and with regret, Daniel (talk) 11:57, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Could you provide a link to the quote you mention please. Adambro (talk) 12:05, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Er, here. Your quote doesn't make sense in its entirety because you left out an "on Wikinews", after the "rather than". Daniel (talk) 12:09, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The full quote, which I stand by reads: ":I contacted ComCom on Daniel's insistence that I should take up my suggestion that there has been some misuse of OTRS access here with the Committee rather than because I have a desire to pursue this beyond what has been said/done here on Wikinews". With this additional context it should be clear that, in explaining my reasoning for contact ComCom, was because Daniel insisted that was the correct channel I should be using rather than because I want to pursue this issue. There never was meant to be an "on Wikinews" after the "rather than". It only doesn't make sense because you're trying to read it differently to how I've written it. Adambro (talk) 12:18, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I seriously cannot understand how it can be read any differently, but whatever. With or without the quote, I stand by every conclusion I came to in my initial comment. Daniel (talk) 12:21, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    There is a separation that I think is being missed here. Wikinews <> WMF. Were this someone leaking documents from another site we'd have no problem and be calling on the Foundation to support us. I've already dragged the EFF into this issue over the DR, and our article should stand. Adambro has acted as an agent of the WMF without their request to do so, and in doing so violated WN:3RR. His intentions were good, but the execution and interaction with other editors has displayed an uncompromising and defensive position that is not good for an Admin. --Brian McNeil / talk 12:31, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    In response to Daniel: Well I would maintain that you are wrong to try to twist my comment by suggesting that there should be additional words in there but I'll go on to address some of the other points you raise. I do not have a history of disruption, I have a history of speaking out when I have concerns and I won't apologise for that. I use appropriate channels to do this but have on this occasion resorted to using revert to try to enforce my position. This is regretful and I've accepted that I might as well wait for the response (if any) from ComCom to clarify this situation. I do however feel that in attempting to enforce the key rule of confidentiality of OTRS tickets that my continued reverting was appropriate but ill judged. As in my previous comments above, I see it irrelevant how I reverted the change, whether or not I used rollback I cannot consider to be important since the end result is pretty much identical to if I was to click "undo".
    The link between this incident and the "CoS checkuser incident" is only that the two incidents have two editors common. I have no personal vendetta against Brian. Whether he is the same is perhaps questionable, quickly turning my disagreement about the appropriateness of this article into some kind of personal dispute and highlighting an example where, shock horror, I dared question the actions of Brian. I fail to see on what basis Daniel suggests there is any element of personal gain on my part that might come from any of it.
    In response to Brian: I am well aware that whilst we are a WMF project, we have a responsibility to our readers to not suppress stories which could show the Foundation in a bad light or whatever. No I'm not an agent of the office but I, like every other editor, have a responsibility to stick to the rules governing what we do. By including this material in the article we are effectively condoning the disregarding of the key OTRS rule that information is confidential. This is not something I want to see Wikinews doing. We have responsibilities to our readers but we also have responsibilities to the Foundation. Adambro (talk) 12:42, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
<not so indented>
My bringing this up on WN:DISPUTE was due to this being another case of you not being a team player. I would rather have seen things played out there than here. This de-admin is using a sledgehammer to crack a nut, and from comments in IRC it seems you (Adambro) still don't see why so many people are pissed at you. For all the serious contributors it should be "Wikinews before WMF" yet this is what your DR is going against. You are putting the rules of the source from which material has allegedly been leaked above those of this site and its goals.
I have no intention of voting in this RfdA, I made that clear early on with my statement that I had raised a dispute item. That was not intended to influence things here, but it may well have. I'd be happy to see this RfdA closed as "disruptive and unlikely to reach a consensus", but that ain't going to happen. And, seriously, you need to take a long, hard look at how some people in the community view you. Are you too conservative? Are you forgetting to park the Commons mindset when you log in here? Seriously. Seriously, I used the nickname "Dr No" (per Ian Paisley) on IRC because it is something everyone can laugh off, but there's also the hope that it will sink in as a, "do people really think of me like that?" thing. Yes, there are those who do. They don't hate you, I can't say it isn't personal, and they usually have other users they wish would be more "with it" and receptive to input, we all have a vision for the site and some aspects are more worth pursuing. --Brian McNeil / talk 16:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I still believe in de-admining only for abuse of privileges. Yes, technically, using rollback for edit warring constitutes such abuse but as he rightly pointed out, using the "undo"-button would have the same result. --+Deprifry+ 13:44, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm glad to see you stepping in here and having an old man raise his voice. :-P I'd like to wistfully think this means you might sustain a higher level of involvement with the project. Wikinews has - to my mind - just started to hit puberty; we need all the words of wisdom we can get. --Brian McNeil / talk 16:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support strongly. Dosen't matter if he could do the same thing if he wasn't an admin. He still overstepped his powers. He has continued to show why he should not be an admin.--Ryan524 (talk) 14:03, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to see this as a wake-up call to Adambro. As mentioned above, if you're logged in here it is "Wikinews before WMF". --Brian McNeil / talk 16:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support -- Per Daniel (talk · contribs). Cirt (talk) 16:56, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Adambro, I would request that you as an admin step down from your position. Admit you made a mistake, and take the consiquences. I would be up to support a future Rfa IF you did the right thing here and stepped down instead of letting the rfda finish, and you makde good edits for a few months to show you have learned from your mistake and it won't happen again.--Ryan524 (talk) 17:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm afraid I'm not going to do so. As I've discussed with you on IRC, the message that will be sent out if this de-adminship request is successful will be that it is acceptable to to violate OTRS rules to obtain information and that it is not acceptable to question the actions of other editors; if you want to make it on Wikinews you keep your mouth shut apart from to say you agree with everyone else. If that is the situation then the chance of me every wishing to become an administrator again would probably be slim. I am simply not prepared to keep quiet about concerns to keep everyone happy. It would be irresponsible and unethical of me to do so. This whole de-adminship is nonsensical. The problem that people have with me is not my use of admin rights, it is that I dare to question their actions. The only thing that will change if/when my rights are removed is that I'll be in a poorer position to contribute my time to maintaining Wikinews. You loose one slightly irritating user who likes to know why things have been done the way they have but contributes a great deal of time using their admin rights towards trying to maintain the project and are left with one slightly irritating user who likes to know why things have been done the way they have but perhaps feel better for giving me a kicking. It is however ultimately the project that will suffer, not simply because we're going to loose one of our more active admins, but more importantly because we'd be encouraging this attitude of patting each over on the back regardless. As Planoneck notes, this whole de-adminship requests smells like an attempt to shut me up because people disagree with what I've said rather than there being any real evidence that I'm not capable of being an admin. Adambro (talk) 18:04, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I am not sure if this little skirmish is enough to de-admin anyone. There have been worse fights and actions and I am not sure if this is one of them that merits a de-admin. Yes adambro broke 3rr but so have others. If this de-admin request is somewhat based on the 3rr then he should have been blocked when it happened. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 18:07, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support; while I believe that the OTRS leak is a serious issue that should be forwarded to ComCom, Adambro has made far too big a deal out of this situation in inappropriate venues, causing unnecessary drama. His shocking inability to adhere to consensus, and use of rollback (yes, rollback is a significant tool, because it tells other users that their edits were so patently offensive or vandalous that an edit summary was unnecessary) are extremely unbecoming an administrator. I had considered weighing in on this request earlier, but wasn't really sure until this edit. Even if Adambro was just trying to let me know about the situation, it was extremely inappropriate to do so on-wiki, causing even more drama. A private e-mail (I have e-mail enabled on Wikinews and Wikipedia) would have been sufficient. In short, I don't believe these actions are becoming of an administrator, and I believe he should be desysopped. Ral315 (talk) 18:26, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose deadminship strongly. Adambro is one of the few editors who are willing to follow policy even when it is controversial. Anonymous101 :) 19:27, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for reconfirmation. Please do not modify it.

Brian McNeil

With recent issues I want the community to vote on whether I should continue in my position. I appreciate resigning everything prompts a snap election for ArbCom, but Jimmy Wales has characterised my leaking of information as unacceptable.

Quote
So, you can add me to the list of people along with Adambro who is,

well, I am not "pushing for" you to resign from OTRS, but I think it would be the proper thing to do.

--Jimbo

--Brian McNeil / talk 22:16, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I think it quite unfair of Brian to selectively quote remarks I made in private in such a fashion that some good editors have interpreted this as some kind of slam by me against Wikinews. In my email I compared Wikinews favorably with the New York Times and argued that we should treat the idea of leaking private communications from 3rd parties to Wikinews as being equal to leaking them to the New York Times. When people email us with concerns, they are owed a duty of respect and care that does NOT include our leaking things to the media, and particularly not in an ad hoc and random fashion. I think it imperative that people keep in mind that I have not criticized Wikinews, that I have not suggested and do not support deadminship for Brianmc on Wikinews, but rather that I am saying that OTRS volunteers have a special position with respect to privacy.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:17, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Brian remarked, I appreciate resigning everything prompts a snap election for ArbCom, but Jimmy Wales has characterised my leaking of information as unacceptable. I believe that secrets breed more secrets. I'm surprised Jimmy's keeping his "loose lips sink ships" ideology even after the scandals of the past year. As Marilyn McCoo would say, "Let the sunshine in!" TheCustomOfLife (talk) 22:32, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I do not have a "loose lips sink ships" ideology at all. I, too, believe that secrets breed more secrets. At the same time, I think it is perfectly appropriate for people who email OTRS with an expectation that their complaint is made in private, deserve respect for that privacy, and that it is wrong to leak those emails to the press... including the New York Times and Wikinews.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:17, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In this case I feel Jimmy has parachuted into the discussion and will run away. I'd rather not get into a fight about that, we would not be here but for him setting the project up. --Brian McNeil / talk 22:52, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have neither parachuted in, nor am I running away. I think there is an important principle at stake here, and one that needs to be openly discussed.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:17, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'll make what comments I feel are appropriate, and considering the context, it is appropriate in my view. TheCustomOfLife (talk) 06:08, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Excuse me? There were anti-Mike-Godwin comments posted? Where? I should hope it is clear to everyone that I'm interested in legally defending the projects, including, by the way, Wikinews. MGodwin (talk) 22:12, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was referring to the first vote (below) as well as the first comment. --SVTCobra 00:04, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't see how the foundation is helping us...If anything, by deleting material, NOT published nor even close to publishing, that makes Wikinews lose credibility. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 22:46, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Do you mean that you don't see how the foundation is helping us beyond providing a free website without advertisements on which to post our news stories? One that has direct links from Wikipedia? One that lets you get accredidation? --SVTCobra 23:05, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thaty's not fair for one. They should look at us with respect and dignity. They should think of us first when they want to publish a story. They should be completely open to defense regarding misquotes or alleged false news stories. They should be more willing to give us the stuff we need to do our jobs instead of intentionally making it harder. When your parent organization starts to censor news stories, that don't show that organization in a good light, IMO that is something to be very concerned about. After all this is an organization against supposed "censorship". But here we are...having this conversation because WMF went against the principal foundation/rule for this and all other WMF projects. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 20:08, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
These threads are beginning to get outside direct relevance to discussing whether or not Brianmc (talk · contribs) should be reconfirmed, IMHO. Cirt (talk) 20:22, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

Hey! I object to Adambro being desysopped! He and I might disagree from time to time, but that's healthy, right? --Brian McNeil / talk 22:36, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There's an obvious question from this... Who is going to nominate Adambro for admin? --Brian McNeil / talk 22:47, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It seems that Cspurrier speedied the de-sysop, no more than 11 minutes after Adambro made this statement diff. While I would nominate, I won't unless Adambro shows an interest in returning. --SVTCobra 22:56, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Adambro (talk · contribs) made the same request on Meta, and Cspurrier (talk · contribs) was responding to that. And FYI, see above, Brianmc (talk · contribs) nominated Adambro for Admin consideration, though Adambro has yet to accept. Cirt (talk) 23:08, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I saw his request on the IRC StewardBot thing, after talking with him on IRC I carried out his request. I hope he remains a Wikinews editor and will reconsider adminship after things ave calmed. --Cspurrier (talk) 03:32, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Regrettably, Adambro has declined the nom. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:11, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've had a quick chat with Mike (TheCustomOfLife), I want to stress that me re-nomming Adambro was not meant to be "playing both sides" or opposing Mike's posted de-admin. I supported the bringing of the de-admin request as a wake up call to Adambro. I wanted him to see that the community had serious concerns over how he comported himself and that here, at least, the news trumps policy on other WMF sites (including OTRS). I expected it to be closed "no consensus" and Adambro suitable chastised. Re-nomming him was a gut reaction because - while so anal that proctologists run screaming - he is a useful contributor and this was the first serious abuse of privs I think I've seen. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:38, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What? Not even David?
Seriously (am I ever serious?) Jimmy has jumped into this without looking and learning. There need to be rules for disclosure and this was a case that I believed merited it. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:11, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We should have that discussion, then. But what remains true is that you did this without asking anyone, and violated the proper expectation of privacy of a third party. If we should have a policy under which some kinds of communications to OTRS are eligible for leaking to the press, then we should have that policy. We should not simply do it in an ad hoc fashion.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:17, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ral315, thank you for your support. I had talked through this with one of the OTRS admins and a short suspension of access was being discussed until Jimmy got involved. Having had a brief Skype chat with Cary this morning (I think he stayed up late to catch me) I believe Jimmy will be getting admonished for jumping in without even having read the OTRS ticket and associated article. Even the EFF are involved in this case now (my fault, I emailed Eddan Katz). There's no movement on the steps to professionalizing per stuff on wikinews-l, and that is seriously frustrating me. We need Wikinews:Journalistic ethics and had I remained an anonymous source I would not be in this position. Yet, I believe in fairly radical transparency and owned up to the leak. Was that wrong? --Brian McNeil / talk 08:11, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Brian abused his position as an OTRS volunteer in releasing the ticket to Cirt. He should consider whether there is a conflict of interests between his position as a reporter for Wikinews, which is generally about making information available, and an OTRS volunteer for the Foundation where information has to be kept private. As I've noted previosuly there is no real justification in releasing the ticket to Cirt, he was never going to be praised for uncovering some great scandal because there wasn't one and the exact details being open don't reallly benefit the community. I think this is simply a poor judgement on Brian's part. My behavior in releation to the DR was however inappropriate. I objected to the article before it was even written on the basis that it was an internal legal matter which we shouldn't be reporting on because it could impact on the discussions between the Foundation and the Church. This is a view which I maintain. Had I nominated the article for deletion on this basis then things would have been more straightforward. The community would have disagreed and addressed the points I raised, the article would have been kept and we'd all live happily ever after, the community with the article being kept and me having had my concerns addressed. However, my mistake was to mention my concerns about to what degree information from OTRS was used in the article. My intial comment about this was certainly not meant to accuse any particular individual of violating OTRS rules but this is how it seems to have come across to Daniel and Brian. It was unfortunate at this stage that due to being busy in real life I wasn't able to quickly clarify my comments to attempt to calm things. Due to the serious nature of OTRS, I should have raised my concerns more sensitivily and by different channels. As it became obvious that the article as whole wasn't going to be deleted I then attempted to remove the material which I considered to have been obtained from OTRS by Brian, as per his comment on the talk page that he had released the ticket to Cirt. This was of course quickly reverted however it was my view that regardless of the view of the community, the rule that OTRS information should be held privately has to be respected and this was why I continued to revert. My comments however, had not convinced anyone else and based upon discussions on IRC it became clear that I'd end up being blocked if I didn't stop and so I left the article alone. I still maintain that information obtained against WMF rules should not be included in our articles. This information wasn't leaked by a third party to us, it was leaked by us and that is completely inappropriate. Whilst much of the community might feel differently, we as a WMF project have a responsibility to play by the rules they set. Just as I'm sure if UK citizens were asked whether they wanted to pay tax anymore the answer would be no, it just isn't going to happen. There is a limit to what can be based on community consensus, we can't do as we wish simply if most people agree. If people want to do so then they can create a new Wikinews, independent of the WMF but I'm sure they'd quickly realise that the problems we have are far outweighed by the benefits we have in being part of the wider WMF family. Brian is a valuable contributor to Wikinews and it is for this reason I feel he shuld retain his admin rights. However, I don't think we can claim that he is without his flaws. His treatement of me during this incident has being as if I'm some prey that he can toy with and laugh as it dies. I've also raised concerns about his blocking of a user for, if I recall, multiple instances of 1 minute which he justified with something along the lines of it making the user look bad by having a long block log. I would suggest rather that this simply reflects badly on him, Wikinews isn't a game, as an admin he should use the tools to do the job the communiy has given not toy with users. He makes mistakes, which I would like it if people recognised, but overalll I think he makes a positive impact on the project. Whether it is appropriate for him to retain OTRS access is a matter for the admins there but I don't think there is any movement towards removal. I understand he has been warned about his behaviour and risks loosing his rights if he disregards OTRS rules again in future. Adambro (talk) 11:02, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This lengthy comment does not address some of the issues raised, but thank you for the support.
First off, does it really matter who or what we're reporting on? Should we really - as you imply - self-censor?
Second, yes I may well be barred from OTRS for a period to "cool off" and reflect. Had I remained an anonymous source we would not be in this position, but the article would have been less credible in the eyes of the community.
You accuse me of treating this like a game. This shows you don't know me as well as you might think; I believe life is a game we are all destined to lose. As my reaction to Mike's feedback on nominating you for adminship should show, I already had a position staked out. I wanted your de-admin to fail but the community be allowed its opportunity to say your choices were wrong and you too often failed to listen to criticism.
The one minute blocks was Symode09, better known on IRC as brown_cat. Again you throw up my actions in my face and fail to see how they might be appropriate in the case in question. I believe - again - the community would support me in that action and you would be in a minority considering it abuse of powers.
Obviously there is no need for us to question whether JWales is supreme overlord of this project. It's like herding cats round here and, well, even Cary took a break from his holiday to point out he opposed my de-sysop and waited up to talk to me regarding this. --Brian McNeil / talk 12:33, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Brian said, Adam is "throw[ing] up my actions in my face and fail to see how they might be appropriate in the case in question." But, Brian, that is exactly what you did to Adam at Wikinews:Dispute resolution/Brianmc and Adambro in your listing of CU discussions. So I don't think you can take the higher ground on that. --SVTCobra 00:54, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support --+Deprifry+ 12:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I can't say I know the specifics of the OTRS situation. But I suport you fully continuing here at Wikinews as an admin and as a b'crat even though I still don't agree with some of your decisions.--Ryan524 (talk) 16:09, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support To me it seems like it's the Pentagon Papers in smaller form... Brian is Daniel Ellsburg and Jimmy and Mike are like Nixon and the plumbers. I have nothing again Mike or Jimmy, but like Brian said, he's kinda parachuting into this discussion and risking turning to it into some sort of WikiWatergate. --TUFKAAP (talk) 04:49, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Slight typo there, it is Daniel Ellsberg and I'm flattered. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:27, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There is a larger issue here, which is how do we deal with things like this? WMF needs a "disclosure policy" that is more sophisticated than "Ask Mike Godwin". Secrecy is an insidious poison and to be avoided wherever possible. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:46, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Secrets are strange alive things abit like kids, very difficult to manage (soupire). Yes, a larger issue, to be discussed cool headed around a beer (or a milk, or a beaujolais, or a single malt, don't mind). A place like wikimania could be choosen but unfortunatly too few wikinewseers'ld attend. Jacques Divol (talk) 11:49, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for adminship that did not succeed. Please do not modify it.

Adambro

I'd like to propose Adambro be given the buttons back. I believe his choice to surrender them was under pressure and inappropriate. His worst fault is he can be too sensible. --Brian McNeil / talk 22:57, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions/Comments

Do you accept this nomination? Cirt (talk) 23:02, 15 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry but I do not want to be considered for adminship at this time. Adambro (talk) 07:35, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.


June 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for de-adminship which resulted in consensus not to remove admin rights and other rights.. Please do not modify it.

User:Chiacomo

User made two edits in May 2008 then you have to go back to December 2007/January 2008 for a short period of editing, then one edit in September 2007, a few in March 2007, one in February 2007, then you've got to back to 2006 for any reasonably prolonged period of editing. I can't consider this level of activity to be appropriate for someone with Bureaucrat, Check user, Oversight, and Sysop rights and therefore propose all are removed. I will notify user of this discussion via email listed on their user page and their talk page. Adambro (talk) 19:27, 9 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note: - 22 July 2005 - original RfA, 23 June 2006 - Bureaucrat discussion

Comments

His talk page has a notification and the nomination explicitly states that an e-mail was sent. --SVTCobra 22:57, 9 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I may still have his phone number lying about. I'll also see if I can get in touch with him. - Amgine | t 23:01, 9 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the notification and I'm glad to see that someone is keeping an eye on me. I browse Wikinews daily and edit almost always anonymously these days (for a variety of reasons). I would like to keep all my "bits" as I hope to be able to become more active as an administrator, bureaucrat, and checkuser. I value the Wikinews community and am proud to have been part of it for so long. I am still involved. I speak to some Wikinewsies frequently, others less so. I still maintain the Wikinews-l mailing list (the SPAM on that list ebbs and flows, there seems to be an increase right now). Several of you have my personal contact information should something urgently need attention...
I personally oppose the removal of privileges except in cases of mis-use. Wikinewsies who know me know that already.
If it is necessary that I involve myself more visibly in the workings of the community, I shall. Regardless, I'll abide, of course, by the consensus of the community. I welcome your questions and comments. --Chiacomo (talk) 03:14, 11 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

Really does that matter? Anyone can edit, anonymously if they choose as well. So really, if he did or did not, I really don't think it matters. Last I checked, there was no policy or anything stating you could not edit anonymously. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 03:11, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No I'm not aware of any policy either but it doesn't stop it being a little strange. I don't understand the reason for doing so hence the question. Logging in is a two second job. Adambro (talk) 06:58, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a no consensus Brian . Please do not modify it.

CommonsDelinker

I propose this bot be given admin privileges for the purpose of edit archived articles in order to replace and/or remove images that have been deleted or replaced at Commons. I talked to the operator, Siebrand, via e-mail, and he has agree to have me make this propsal. Maxim(talk) 14:56, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Comment This isn't the first time this has been proposed. I think it will be necessary to clarify what exactly this bot does before anyone starts voting. Where an image is deleted from Commons, does the community want for the red link to be removed or replaced by a place holder image as is done on some projects I understand. Replacements are fairly uncontroversial, these are done in the case of duplicates on Commons for example and I see no problem allowing the bot admin rights to do these. We get a reasonable number of editprotected requests for these changes to be made as it is and so if these could be done automatically then it would save time of the admins here. So I see no problem with replacements, it is just how the community wants deleted Commons images to be dealt with that needs agreeing first. Adambro (talk) 15:05, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment My key concern with this bot is that, if granted admin status, there will be unreviewed changes to archived articles. I believe it has been declined the status in the past due to being spotted replacing images that were noticeably different. Also, the removal of images that have been deleted from Commons needs highlighted in case there is a chance the image can be transferred to Wikinews and retained under our EDP. --Brian McNeil / talk 16:40, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    To comment on your latter point, doesn't Wikinews:CommonsTicker serve this purpose? Adambro (talk) 16:54, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The previous request is at Wikinews:Administrators/Archive_3#User:CommonsDelinker Anonymous101 (talk) 19:40, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment There was previously a proposal on the water cooler to have a new user class that would be able to edit all pages, but would not have any of the other admin privs. This would be an ideal case for such a priv. Bawolff ☺☻ 20:50, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I have reverted an improper closing of this RfA as only Bureaucrats are supposed to perform this task. No, in my role as Bureaucrat I will not be closing it. I commented on this and am unhappy with my answer, those who run this bot have had next to no involvement in the discussion and I will leave it to someone else to decide if the handful of 'votes for laziness' are sufficient to merit granting such a right to a process that runs off a different project's rules. --Brian McNeil / talk 19:13, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Improper"? Insofar as I can tell nowhere on Wikinews is it stated that "only Bureaucrats are supposed to perform this task" - unless this is written down somewhere already? If so, I was unaware of that until now and my apologies. Cirt (talk) 19:29, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nevermind, I suppose 4 votes, when considered with the comments, did seem a tad early anyways. Cirt (talk) 20:22, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It was not meant as a criticism, more as a concern that four votes to give a right to a software agent seems a little underwhelming to be called consensus. Particularly when it appears some of the votes are from people who are not heavily involved with Wikinews. I hope that changes for these people, but as the vote stood at that time I could not with a clear conscience have granted the bot sysop. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:35, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  • Support In my edit history you will find a lot of editprotected requests that take a lot of time for us to make. CD facilitates the process of replacing and delinking files that are duplicates or deleted, and does a pretty good job at that, unless pages are protected, which appears to be standard practice for main namespace pages here. Siebrand (talk) 15:05, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support bot has causes no harm and makes helpful edits. In addition, nearly all the editprotected requests are about deleted images so this bot would lessen the amount of work for admins. Anonymous101 (talk) 15:06, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support As a lazy admin, I see that this bot can ony lessen our workload. Just so long as future script changes are scrutinised very carefully first. Blood Red Sandman (Talk) (Contribs) 15:36, 22 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral as a matter of fact i do not understand why if an image is used on wikinews, this image is deleted without any fix from commons. Jacques Divol (talk) 15:57, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, there is a clash between the project rules. Wikinews allows local upload under an EDP. Every changed or deleted image should be matched against that policy and an effort made to fit within it. I wrote WN:ARCHIVE and applied that to over 3,000 articles. I simply do not believe that following that and taking the required care is a process that can be trusted to a bot under the control of multiple Commons admins who may never even have looked at Wikinews' front page. --Brian McNeil / talk 10:22, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose (late vote) Agreed that this seems a bit hasty and a bit much tools to give to a bot at this time. Cirt (talk) 19:28, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    It is just editing protected pages. --Maxim(talk) 20:28, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes and in that case some sort of format should be constructed to give it that capability without the full tools. Cirt (talk) 20:30, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    You do not trust Siebrand to not use the account for malicious purposes? A bot (or script) can only do what its owner told it to do (ie programmed). It only edits pages, replacing images. Because of Wikinews' archiving conventions, the bot is unable to edit most articles without a sysop bit. Granting it the sysop bit will enable it to do so. Maxim(talk) 20:33, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    It is not a matter of trust - in fact I do trust Siebrand who has done good work on this project. It is moreso that if the capability exists to give a bot less tools or the specific tools needed for this specific purpose, that should be done instead of promoting it to sysop. Cirt (talk) 20:35, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The sysop bit is the specific tool, albeit carrying a few more features. What is so wrong about giving those features, considering you trust Siebrand? Maxim(talk) 20:38, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    This conversation is getting circular, unfortunately. Please see my previous response. Cirt (talk) 20:43, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    (unindent) I don't understand what is so bad about giving a bot sysop access to edit protected pages. Maxim(talk) 20:45, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Until we have an alternative to giving bots adminship I don't consider it appropriate to make the lack of such a feature opposition for an adminship request. We discussed a user class for editing protecting pages but this didn't seem to come to much. I'd suggest that if the lack of such a user class prevents users from supporting this or any other request for a bot to have admin rights then they attempt to make progress with the proposal for a new user class. Adambro (talk) 20:53, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    As it seems that multiple individuals are voicing trust of the individual that will be the operator of a bot with possible sysop tools, Siebrand (talk · contribs), who is not an admin, perhaps the RfA should be about the individual instead of a bot - rather, perhaps the operator of the bot should be considered for adminship instead of, and prior to, granting tools to the operator's bot. Cirt (talk) 03:45, 1 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Since no one seems to be suggesting that Siebrand can't be trusted I can't see the reasoning behind this beyond distracting us from discussing this bot. Siebrand doesn't want admin rights and since adminship is generally based upon more than trust, nor would he be likely to get admin rights based upon his level of experience here. I fail to see what useful purpose considering granting admin rights to Siebrand could serve. Users can raise any concerns about him here which is the most appropriate venue. Adambro (talk) 06:30, 1 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support I see giving this bot as being very low risk whilst bringing tangible benefits to the project in reducing the workload for our admins here in dealing with {{editprotected}} requests. CommonsDelinker is a very well established bot and I am not aware of any terrible drama occurring on other projects which would concern me about it operating with admin rights here. I think the "votes for laziness" are based upon perfectly valid concerns, nothing gets done here without someone donating their time to get it done and so anything which allows contributors to concentrate on writing news has to be a positive thing. Adambro (talk) 19:47, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm afraid I simply do not trust people on Commons, or a bot operated by their project, not to replace an image with one taken ten years after an event. --Brian McNeil / talk 20:09, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Try assuming good faith once in a while. The anti-Commons attitude is very tiring. Commons isn't a closed community nor are actions of a particular Commons user necessarily representative of the attitude. If people have issues with actions on Commons then they can take them up via the appropriate process there and, if people did take the time to understand Commons they would be in a better position to appreciate the problems the project faces. Is there any evidence of images being replaced by CommonsDelinker in situations like you fear? Adambro (talk) 20:31, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I am not assuming malicious intent, I am fearing well-meaning damage. --Brian McNeil / talk 20:51, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What damage? This bot replaces duplicates (or near duplicates when ordered by a human administrator of Commons), or removes an image deleted at Commons for various reasons. Maxim(talk) 21:15, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<unindent> This does not match the edit summary, " explain what bot actually does". The bracketed clause allows for substitution with a picture not at the right place in time to match our article. --Brian McNeil / talk 21:19, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Let me expound on that a bit... When Commons is on the ball and these issues are dealt with within the WN:ARCHIVE ten-day window I have no problems, even when the result is losing an image. My concern is that with access to protected pages this bot could reach far back in time once the project is a few years older. The change would work for everywhere but Wikinews. --Brian McNeil / talk 21:30, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My understanding here was that we are primarily concerned with duplicates and so there is no issue although I'm not completely familiar with the replacements that this bot does so perhaps if Brian can come up with some examples where the changes it has made somewhere would be inappropriate here then that would be helpful. Regarding your first point, I think this highlights a major problem here. The attitude seems to be that because "we aren't Commons" that we don't have to concern ourselves about images. We have as much responsibility to look for problems with images as anyone else, if not more when it is us using them. Where Wikinews uses images from Commons it is up to us to spend a little bit of time to make sure that the image is legit, claiming ignorance about image licensing is no defence. If people don't take the time to try to understand these issues then they shouldn't be using images in articles. As such, if a problem with an image isn't found before an article is archived it is as much our fault as anyone from Commons. Adambro (talk) 22:13, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support The anticommonsism is getting old. I fail to see what harm this bot could cause. --+Deprifry+ 22:42, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose We do enough editing to the archives already that we aren't really supposed to...we don't need to do anymore. If the image was good when it was uploaded/added, then we shouldn't remove it. We have enough deletion of images as it is. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 22:48, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Not giving this bot admin rights won't do anything to change the number of images that get deleted. Instead we'll just be left with ugly red links in our articles. This bot is about dealing with images that have already been deleted, this bot isn't responsible for doing so. Adambro (talk) 23:01, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose No one seems to have addressed Brian's concern. It sounds like we need a modified bot here which locally mirrors all delinked images, posts side by side comparison on the article talk page, and adds the talk page to an image review page or category. Admins could purge these talk pages from that category or review page after evaluating them. All these modification are trivial except for the mirroring, which still isn't too hard. Nyarlathotep (talk) 22:57, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Brian's concern seems to be that images will be replaced inappropriately. This can simply be addressed by looking at the type of replacements that are made. Like I've said, I can't claim to have a great understanding of what instances an image will be replaced but perhaps we should try to before worrying that inappropriate replacements will be made. Adambro (talk) 23:03, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Or we can stick with what we've got - real eyeballs looking at things. Not, the ever-so-faith-inspiring platitude, "or near duplicates when ordered by a human administrator of Commons". --Brian McNeil / talk 23:06, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<unindent>I am surprised there are not more people expressing concern about mucking about with historical records. I feel all such changes should require human judgement prior to intervention. --Brian McNeil / talk 23:34, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Brian. "Real eyeballs" are looking at things. A human admin looks at an image and decides whether it's a dupe or not. What I mean by a near-dupe is a dupe that's not a pixel-by-pixel dupe, but close enough (different resolution, or an edited image, for example). Maxim(talk) 23:42, 29 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Forgive me not having huge amounts of faith, I've had a Commons admin try to tell me Wikinews didn't have local upload enabled so I do have serious concerns that many don't know enough about policy on projects a change may impact. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:27, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My point was we could have it both ways, modify the article automagically but record all the changes on the talk page. I imagine the great majority of common's changes are fine, but we don't want the screw ups. So just make the change, but leave a proper trail. We could even leave two edits : 1st relink to the mirrored image, 2nd switch to the new image. If you dislike one, then revert the 2nd edit but not the first. Nyarlathotep (talk) 00:39, 1 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Our Archive is just that...an archive. Once protected, regardless of who or what wants to do something, it stays that way. If an edit needs to be made, a real person can leave a message on the talk page, or the watercooler or WN:AAA. The archives get damaged enough as it is, and I oppose any further damage. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 02:43, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And you of course are operating under the assumption that the contributors to the wiki would do more harm than good to the archive, and on average, not follow policy, guidlines, and/or consensus if it the archives were unprotected. I suppose in theory, this could be the case. Please feel free to correct me if my assessment is inaccurate. And I suppose this could be the case as well. --Emesee (talk) 05:51, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
DragonFire1024 is not always the best at articulating a point of view; you need to have read a lot of what he has written to read the meaning in some of his somewhat hostile comments. They're not meant to be taken that way, but not everyone can be diplomatic all the time.
Go look at my talk page on Commons. Then look at the image I got that stinkin' big boilerplate for. Would you not be irritated that someone didn't spot the "please contact me on Wikinews" message? I see similar isolationism and over-focus on a favourite project here on Wikinews too. We can't force every single new Commons admin to go on a course explaining why a news agency's archive is so important, so keeping it inconvenient to change this is my, and I believe DF's, preferred option. --Brian McNeil / talk 10:12, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Enable email notifications of changes to your Commons talk page in your preferences and there won't be a problem. Adambro (talk) 11:53, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support The less time us humans have to spend messing around with archived pages, the better. ~Planoneck~ 00:52, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral leaning towards oppose. I think, along with Nyarlathotep, that this is the wrong type of bot for Wikinews. We do not want to change the archives - full stop. So we need a bot that moves images that are being deleted from Commons to our localspace. However, CommonsDelinker isn't going to do harm, per se, it's just not what we need or want. --Skenmy(t•c•w) 09:33, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    This, I think, is the best suggestion to-date. I would be quite happy to see images that are being deleted from Commons uploaded locally - even if this was accompanied with a deletion request. I would far rather see people forced to look at such issues than them quietly be 'sorted' and scroll out of the default recent changes display. The value of the Wikinews archives will only grow as time passes, this has to be more important than a little convenience. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    If people did take a little time to look at image issues then we'd have a lot less images disappearing from archived articles in the first place. Since there is a general lack of appetite for dealing with image issues here I can't say I have a great deal of confidence in the community's ability to sort out any images locally uploaded following deletion on Commons. I think we'd end up with yet more images with very questionable fair use rationales and unclear source information being kept because it is the easy thing to do, with the weak suggestion that the intention of the archiving principle of the project somehow justifies us doing so. Brian's own position on my attempts to clear up some image issues here demonstrates perfectly that nothing would get resolved, valid concerns about images get dismissed as a "crusade" presumably because to address them would be an inconvenience. As I continue to say, I don't believe that in 99% of cases removing images in any way changes a readers impression of the slant of a story. Until such time as the Foundation say it is okay for us to ignore image issues once articles are archived then this issue will remain. I would be slightly doubtful of the Foundation's ability to take such a position however though because from a legal point of view, for as long as unfree images are hosted on the site we have to be able to justify their use. I can't see an article being archived being an appropriate justification since the image can be removed very easily unlike say a newspaper or a magazine which can't do anything when they've gone to print. If users are going to continue to assert that we can't remove images from archived articles then go and get campaign for the Foundation to approve a resolution which says so. Doing so would put a stop do these arguments once and for all. Adambro (talk) 11:53, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.


July 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

Adambro

I would like to ask that the community considers reinstating my admin rights. I don't think I need to say too much as I'm sure most will be aware of the circumstances in which I resigned the rights but I'd also hope that the positive contribution that I feel I've made during my time here at Wikinews is also recognised. I have a strong desire to continue contributing my time to improve the project and see having rights as helpful in doing so. My position on image licensing issues is primarily what has caused controversy and for this I apologise, not for my opinion that we should strive to minimise the use of unfree content, but how the way I've gone about trying to promote this which has caused upset within the community. I've obviously had a reasonable amount of time now since giving up admin rights to look back out how I've handled some of these controversial issues and have learned a lot from this. Whilst I would not consider to have ever misused my admin rights, I can admit to have had instances of poor judgment and would endeavor to think more carefully about admin actions in future. I would be happy to answer any questions anyone may have but don't expect me to attempt to defend all of my actions, I will try to explain why I took a particular course of action but where I've clearly made mistakes I'll admit to doing so. Adambro (talk) 10:39, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Comment Can you promise to consult the community over questionable images rather than just use the tools to zap them? I'm sure you will, since you've seen the battles over these, this is more a formality than anything. Blood Red Sandman (Talk) (Contribs) 11:37, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Indeed I can, I've seen what happens when I make unilateral controversial decisions about images and don't wish for this to happen again. Adambro (talk) 11:40, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • You've been without adminship for a while. Well that helps you reflect on life (some say even the universe, and with the physics nut around - everything), its important to not loose site of the tenants of adminship, what separates us admins from lowly users. I'm going to ask you a quick question to make sure you are still familiar with the inner workings of the administrative cabal:
  • Comment - It has been over 9 days since this RfA discussion started. Is there a 'crat ready to close it yet? Seems that the consensus at this point in time is pretty straightforward. Cirt (talk) 21:05, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment at least two of our Bureaucrats are attending Wikimania presently, I suppose that accounts for the delay. --SVTCobra 23:41, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  • Support per the above conversation. Adambro has shown himself to be otherwise trustworthy and I believe him when he says he's learnt his lesson. I don't believe we will see a repeat of the problems that led to him giving up the rights and therefore have no issues with them being returned to him. Blood Red Sandman (Talk) (Contribs) 11:46, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support The one issue Adambro and I clash on is the EDP, in all other aspects of the running of the site we're pretty much in agreement. --Brian McNeil / talk 12:20, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Neutral Based on the extreme negative stance Adambro has taken towards the embargoed wiki proposal I withdraw my support. I have yet to see any constructive input on something which has previously been voted on and given significant support. --Brian McNeil / talk 23:03, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    It is a shame that you consider my opinion on the current proposal to make me unfit to be an administrator. I haven't taken a negative view of the proposal simply for the sake of it. I initially supported the proposal but having taken more time to consider it I decided I could no longer support it. I cannot in anyway rule out my opinion on the proposal changing as the proposal itself develops. When I initially opposed this private Wiki back in January I didn't simply state that I opposed it, I took the time to outline my reasons for doing so and, by implication, suggested what changes to the proposal which would satisfy my concerns. I would strongly dispute your suggestion that my raising of concerns wasn't constructive and the fact that these appear to be shared by some other users would confirm that these are genuine issues and haven't simply been manufactured to enable me to take a negative position as has sometimes been suggested. The discussion of this back in January, regardless of the level of support, failed to see this implemented and so DragonFire1024 has attempted to progress this proposal and it is appropriate that these changes are discussed. It is important to recognise that as has been shown, a community consensus isn't enough to convince the developers to set this up and so it is imperative that we take the time to carefully analyse each and every point of this proposal so we can not only present a consensus to the developers, we can also present a solid argument accompanied by a carefully drafted proposal. DragonFire1024 has been listening carefully to the comments made and has been amending the proposal as appropriate and this is greatly respected but don't mistake my lack of agreement with the proposal to be a lack of respect for him or wider community. Adambro (talk) 10:27, 15 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Maxim(talk) 12:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Jacques Divol (talk) 14:02, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support --SVTCobra 14:19, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support So i can stop being confused everytime you put something for speedy deletion :P Bawolff ☺☻ 16:01, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support I still don't see why his rights were removed originally. Also, approving this RfA will mean that vandalism article creations and images that are moved to commons will be deleted much more quickly. Anonymous101 (talk) 17:19, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Adambro asked that his privileges be removed on May 15, 2008. He spoke with Cspurrier on IRC after which Adambro was desysoped. --SVTCobra 18:25, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
He asked, but only when under pressure to do so. Anonymous101 (talk) 18:26, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There was an open de-admin request, but he likely would have survived that. Adambro refused requests to change his mind about resigning and refused to stand for a new nomination. So, respectfully, I must say I believe your assessment is wrong. --SVTCobra 18:38, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It wasn't going very well, he may not have survived that request. Mike Halterman (talk) 19:19, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If anyone cares, that vote was 5-4 in favor of de-admin at the time it was halted. --SVTCobra 22:30, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I doubt Adambro would have asked for de-adminship if the de-adminship wasn't started although you are right that Adambro refused requests to change his mind about resigning and refused to stand for a new nomination. Anonymous101 (talk) 18:47, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My take on the situation was this: My adminship had become too contentious, even if the request to remove my rights was unsuccessful, it was clear that several members of the community did not have confidence in my ability to fulfil my responsibilities as an administrator. I decided that it would be appropriate for me to resign these rights to allow me to step back from the situation at the time, consider my actions, and try to limit the disruption that the de-adminship request was causing. I requested that my admin rights be removed on Meta and confirmed this as valid by editing my page here and this was then done by Cspurrier. Brianmc then soon after nominated me to get admin rights back but I didn't feel in a position to accept the nomination at that time, needing more of a break from the responsibilities of adminship, so I declined. I now feel confident that I can serve the community to the level I consider is required. Adambro (talk) 18:59, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate talk page. No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

Chris Mann

Chris Mann (talk · contribs) has been a steady positive contributor to this project for almost a year now, since August 2007. I often see Chris pitching in and helping out, sometimes even answering questions and "acting as if" an admin already. I am nominating Chris Mann for consideration for adminship. Cirt (talk) 03:57, 23 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Sure. I think I know the ropes well enough to handle it, and would appreciate being able to do admin tasks myself rather than having to report them and wait for someone to come along (and with the huge gap in time zones between me and the majority of admins, that can sometimes be a while). Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 00:47, 24 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate talk page. No further edits should be made to this page.

August 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for checkuser rights. Please do not modify it.

Brianmc

Brianmc (talk · contribs) has effectively been checkuser since his election to the local arbcom. Because we've had to remove the status in order to enforce established checkuser policy requiring arbcoms be supported by 25-30 users, I'm suggesting that his name be put forth as a checkuser again. Cary Bass (talk) 22:47, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Comment Before we start considering whether or not Brianmc (or anyone else) should have checkuser rights I think we should really first be discussing whether anyone having local checkuser rights is necessary. How often are these rights used and in what kind of circumstances? Adambro (talk) 23:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    The rights, according to the log, have been used almost daily in the last month; in many cases as cross-wiki checks, sometimes finding vandals. I think that Wikinews is high profile enough to merit at the very least a pair of checkusers. Cary Bass (talk) 23:29, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I think how much they are used is not all the story. Are all these checks really necessary? In what kind of circumstances are checks being made? Adambro (talk) 23:38, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have to question everything? Yes, they are needed. Look up JvT or Grawp as examples of very persistent vandals who work cross-wiki. Checkuser includes access to a private mailing list where this information is shared, allowing such pests to be caught with a proactive approach as opposed to a reactive approach. It is perhaps the case that you see no need for this because I've been diligently doing the job. --Brian McNeil / talk 07:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That would be my feeling as well, both Brians are very competent and conscientious CUs. I'm not clear why Adambro is casting such aspersions. ++Lar: t/c 13:32, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
See here for an indication of some of the things needing dealt with. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:18, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Per the discussion yesterday with Cary in IRC these votes are pointless unless at least 25 support votes are garnered. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:17, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    ...and these votes are just as pointless if they rely on having to canvass users who aren't active to support them. It is very disappointing that Cary seems to be happy for this to go on. If we're going to let anyone count towards the required numbers then we might as well just put a stop to this nonsense and grant checkuser to anyone who wants it now. I find it quite shocking however that people who aren't active here can have a say about who gets to access confidential information about those who are. Adambro (talk) 12:52, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I should not be disappointed that you seem to see the support from people not active on this project as "pointless". Yet I am. You have utterly ignored the example of what limited public information is available that I have given above and chosen to fasten onto this comment and then decided to promogulate a view which I firmly believe is detrimental to the project. CheckUser is not a game, it is not a barnstar or brownie point in your favour, it is a job - and, based on experience - I would describe it as a thankless task which remains invisible to the community at large. Where - as I have strived to do - this job is diligently and competently carried out, you will see nothing; cross-wiki vandals who have started elsewhere are blocked before they get to Wikinews, open proxies are identified before they become a problem - and the accounts created through them blocked.
Wikinews is a very small community, mustering the required votes on a purely local basis is an unrealistic goal. It would only serve to further your agenda of denying me this privilege and be seriously detrimental to the project as people would be forced to constantly run to stewards for something that could - and should - be handled locally.
Your personal vendetta against me has become tiresome. It should be painfully obvious to all involved in the project that such is the nature of your comments herein. You disrupted the ArbCom elections by attempting to vote oppose and, despite several requests to do so, refused to reformulate your input as a question or other constructive input that could be responded to. I will make no bones about the fact that I am strong-willed and notably opinionated, and I will make no effort to change that. Get used to the facts, if I believe a troll deserves a taste of their own medicine I will give them it, if a childish teenager merits a series of short blocks until they notice and raise it in IRC - I'll do it, and if some plonker who has swallowed a dictionary marches in and tries to tell us how to do things I'll reserve the right to swear at them. --Brian McNeil / talk 13:45, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to address the point about non-regulars "can have a say about who gets to access confidential information about those who are [active on en.WN].".
  1. Firstly, since I became a CU on Wikisource, all of my checkuser access has been on users and IPs that are not related to anybody in the local en.WS community - my checks are on vandals or situations where I expect zero results, because I know the local community well and I'm pretty sure that the check I am performing is unnecessary, but still I run the check in case there is something unusual going on. CUs are not given the right to access confidential information about local users - they must have a need to know before using the tool. If you suspect that checks are being run on local community members inappropriately, talk to the ombudsman.
  2. The second point I want to make is that the local community can write a more restrictive policy on Checkuser access. On Wikisource we have additional checks and balances written by the local community. If there were foreigners coming in to support or reject a local policy, that would be cause for concern.
  3. Finally, the extra support coming from afar is from stewards and checkusers, a cross-wiki group of Wikimedians who are for obvious reasons interested in checkuser nominations, as we are going to have to trust these people in discussions on the private checkuser list. The requirement that there are 25-30 users who support the nomination is to ensure that someone cant easily gain access to the checkuser discussions by holding a local checkuser election on a quiet wiki to obtain a 100% majority of 5 users.
John Vandenberg (talk) 08:00, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Of the users that have so far voted in support, I am unable to consider the following to be active members of the Wikinews community and as such their votes should be discounted from the required number. Presumably this situation is similar with the other nominations. My next question would be where has the canvassing to get these users involved gone on? Adambro (talk) 13:05, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    1. Lar - last edit in August 07, total edits 13
    2. DerHexer - last edit in January 08, total edits 6
    3. GreenReaper - last edit in November 07, total edits 189
    4. Alison - last edit July 08, total edits 4
    5. Herbythyme - last edit December 2007, total edits 7
    I can't speak for others, but I founded and managed WikiFur for the last three years. Before that I co-founded and ran the Creatures Wiki. I was a presenter at Wikimania 2006. I've created three news articles here, the first of which was made a featured article, the second winning me an original reporting barnstar. No, I'm not very active here, but I think I've made valuable contributions and have experience of what is necessary to run a large, high-profile wiki. I came into #wikinews to report news in the middle of this discussion, and I felt I should do something to resolve the problem, so I did. GreenReaper (talk) 01:21, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I wouldn't worry much about it. Who Adambro considers to be relevant voters doesn't matter; there are specific guidelines as to who may or may not participate in a poll. What Adambro personally thinks on the matter doesn't really enter into it, and only shows his ongoing unwillingness to work with the community as it is, rather than as he decides it is. - Amgine | t 03:50, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I've not tried to claim that what I've said is anything other than my opinion and I am perfectly entitled to express it despite your opinion. I am currently unaware of any "specific guidelines as to who may or may not participate" in this poll and would therefore invite you to point out what these are. Adambro (talk) 11:47, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Am I right in assuming you are referring to "All participants are equal. If you are a good faith participant to Wikinews, your opinion counts as much as others." when you say specific guidelines? --John Vandenberg (talk) 12:54, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Adambro: See the policy Jayvdb mentioned, above. - Amgine | t 02:46, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Jayvdb: Actually, it's the line following that one which clearly indicates whose votes might not count in a poll: "For practical reasons, people participating without an account will be excluded from polls..." - Amgine | t 02:46, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Edit counts do not tell the whole story. I think I have plenty of standing to comment on this since I have first hand experience working with the candidates. I'm a steward, and active on many wikis. I'm also a CU on several wikis, and have had many chances to interact with both Brians in the course of performing their and my duties. I administer the CU list, processing adds and removals to the subscriber base. I became aware that Wikinews had lost its CUs when I saw Brian removed. That lack of CUsh is quite concerning, as my judgment is that WN really needs competent and active CUs. I can't speak for the other people you single out, except to say that for the most part they too are CUs or stewards who have a good basis for evaluating your candidates since they have worked closely with them via the CU list as well. The community can choose to disregard that input if it likes. But we stewards and fellow CUs are here because we're concerned, we don't think WN should be without CUs and we are trying to help resolve that. I rather think that Newsies should be GLAD we turned up to try to help. Because if these CU requests fail, we'll be here anyway, those of us that are stewards, doing the work that a local CU could have been doing had the community not rallied around, and surely not doing it as well, since we are not quite as in tune with the community as local CUs would be. ++Lar: t/c 13:32, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Lar is certainly "speaking for me" in the sense that I agree with him. The more vandals are caught on larger wikis the more they move to smaller ones. I have been supporting/promoting the use of local CU on wikis for well over 18 months now. Active CUs on wikibooks substantially reduced vandalism there. Stewards are good but sometimes they have other priorities so local is best. If I do not meet a criteria for voting - fine. However my views are - I think - valid, given my experience. That said I dislike voters turning up from elsewhere on "my" wikis so the community must be happy with this. If they are I am happy to help. --Herby talk thyme 14:13, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I think that Lar, Herby, and GreenReaper have given fair and valid justifications of why they should be entitled to have a say in this election. I really would like to see some indication that this is accepted by the community and there is not going to be wrangling over what votes are or are not valid when the election is closed. The actual reality of the vote closing is that Cary will probably perform it, and will count input from stewards and those with CU on other wikis. With not an oppose vote in sight I really would like to see the Wikinews community come together on this. BrianNZ and I have made the cut if there is no dispute over vote validity, but from private communications I understand there is concern from these non-Wikinewsies about endorsing Skenmy due to the issue of "outside interference" being raised. This might best be described as "once bitten, twice shy"; the outside votes for myself and the other Brian were made before this concern was raised, if there is a general on-project consensus that input from stewards and those with CU elsewhere is valid, then I have every confidence that skenmy will also be granted the privilege (aside, why do we call it a priv.? It's moar work.)
At this point, I believe it is important to give an example of what CheckUser achieves. A few months back an email to the checkuser list highlighted an IP address that was causing disruption on several other projects. This is pretty much routine, and the job of someone with the CU privilege is to make sure they keep up with such issues and follow up on such alerts. On Wikinews, running a CU on the address turned up - just at the edge of data retention - an "on Wheels" account; some to and fro on the CU mailing list led to a consensus to block, across all projects, the IP for six months. Have you seen Willy on Wheels since? This is CheckUser working; questioning why we need people with CheckUser access is like asking why you pay a gardener when there are no weeds in your flower beds. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:51, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  1. Support as nom. Cary Bass (talk) 22:47, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support as well. Brianmc is the shining example of dedication and work in this community and I feel the status quo should not be changed. Mike Halterman (talk) 22:50, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support Absolutely. ++Lar: t/c 23:09, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Support 100%, irrevocably, and totally. Would make an excellent CU, as demonstrated by his complete dedication to the Wikinews projects and consistent presence in #wikinews and #wikinews-en. Thor Malmjursson (talk) 23:13, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. support Regards, DerHexer (talk) 23:19, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Support. I don't feel rights previously granted should be taken away without cause, and Wikinews has a high enough profile that it will be beneficial for local users to have them. GreenReaper (talk) 23:23, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Very strong support. Met him at Wikimania, and I know for sure he's a sane guy (even though he wears a kilt ^_^) One of our most active editors, cares very much about the project so will make a good checkuser. Majorly (talk) 23:25, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support - a very good editor that has been around for a long time :)...--Cometstyles 23:31, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support - definitely - Alison (talk) 01:03, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support.--Jcart1534 (talk) 01:51, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Support - per nom. Cirt (talk) 01:53, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Support Cary thinks he's a good person for the job, how can you say no to that? Oh yea, and seems to be a decent person --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 02:37, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Support DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 05:39, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Support --Herby talk thyme 07:06, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Support Daniel (talk) 11:16, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  16. Support --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 12:38, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Support I have full trust in Brian. He is one of our longest standing members and fully deserves to be trusted in this way. --Skenmy(t•c•w) 13:24, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  18. Support Okay, I'm convinced on two points. Firstly that local checkusers would probably be helpful and that Brianmc can be trusted to use it appropriately. I remain unconvinced however that we should be inviting users who aren't active here to participate in these discussions as I don't consider it to be in the spirit of the checkuser policy. Adambro (talk) 15:13, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Thank you for the support, I do appreciate it can be difficult to see what purpose CU serves, but it is important. Those not heavily involved who have voted are from the steward and non- en.wn checkuser community. Their votes are based on private interaction with myself and the other Brian. Consider them a vote of confidence and mark of trust that we will do what is required to serve the community's best interests. I have taken advantage of Cary whitelisting my emails to checkuser-l after I was removed from the list to solicit their input here, and to pass on my personal recommendation that skenmy be granted the privilege. I would, in general, agree that we don't want a lot of outside input on our decision making processes, but I think this is a situation where we need to be more practical. 25 votes is a lot for en.wn, but I'd hope everyone involved with the community shares my wish that such an assertion becomes silly and obsolete. --Brian McNeil / talk 15:53, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  19. Support Long time user, and trusted. Strenght of nom. rootology (T) 15:26, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Support Respected by just about everyone. Naerii (talk) 16:26, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Support per others (only four more supports needed) Anonymous101talk 16:33, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  22. Support well, uh, yeah! I'm a checkuser on en:wp (so know what the job takes) and he's been great at the job already. - David Gerard (talk) 18:29, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  23. Support Trustworthy. Cbrown1023 talk 18:45, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Support Has my full trust and confidence. Durova (talk) 01:26, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  25. Support John Vandenberg (talk) 06:04, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  26. Support Looks good. --Kanonkas (talk) 10:48, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  27. Support Has my full trust and confidence, and has had for years. - Amgine | t 00:57, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  28. Support While Brian's personality may be abrasive at times, he has clearly shown his competency with checkuser tools and I see no problem in having them restored. Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 02:15, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  29. Support I agree with Chris Mann here. Brianmc is the only one of the three users who I've seen enough of (so far) to trust with tools like this, so he's the only one I can actively express support for. Gopher65talk 15:42, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  30. Support Jacques Divol (talk) 20:16, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  31. Support I hope that my vote won't be discounted on the grounds that I have few edits here. I have thousands of edits on WP, WQ and WS and an a bureaucrat on WQ and an admin on WS so I know how vital it is to have checkusers. I see no reason not to entrust this critical tool to this candidate.--Poetlister (talk) 12:02, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  32. Support Absolutely, The Mind's Eye (talk) 21:05, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for checkuser rights. Please do not modify it.

Brian (Brian New Zealand)

The standard checkuser policy requires at least two users to have checkuser to provide oversight for one another. I would like to suggest that Brian (talk · contribs) be granted this status. He is an accredited Wikinews reporter and bureaucrat, and an OTRS member, trusted Commons user, and Wikipedia administrator as well. It has been a pleasure working with him in the past, and I feel he is well-suited to this additonal responsibility. GreenReaper (talk) 23:23, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment I accept this nom, as we do need two cu per policy, and well, personally I feel I have been non controversial as a CU. I have always been able to process CU promptly – even during my less editing this year, and would like to able to continue to serve wikinews in this manner. I also will not vote in this election, due to my name been nominated Brian | (Talk) | New Zealand Portal 23:27, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Votes

  1. Support as nominator. GreenReaper (talk) 23:23, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support Established checkuser, should be able to use the tools effectively. Cary Bass (talk) 23:26, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support - kiwi kiwi kiwi - oi oi oi A very established experienced CU, what more do you need? :) :DD..--Cometstyles 23:34, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Support - Let's have an all Brian CU team! (unless Craig can be convinced to stand again) ++Lar: t/c 23:46, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Support - of course :) - Alison (talk) 01:03, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. 100% Support - An excellent user, good contact and fantastic WN contributor, also consistent presence on IRC. Thor Malmjursson (talk) 01:34, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Support. --Jcart1534 (talk) 01:51, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support - Per nom. Cirt (talk) 01:54, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support I find this Brian's work to be outstanding as well and I trust him completely with such tools. Mike Halterman (talk) 02:35, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support "Commons Trusted User" ROFL. That is not much in the way of a credential ^_^ --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 02:38, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Support DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 05:40, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Support --Herby talk thyme 07:07, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Support per the usual. terinjokes | Talk 07:20, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Support --Brian McNeil / talk 07:29, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Support Anonymous101talk 07:31, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  16. support DerHexer (talk) 07:32, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Support Daniel (talk) 11:16, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  18. Support --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 12:38, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  19. Support I have full trust in this Brian aswell. He is another of our longest standing members and fully deserves to be trusted in this way. --Skenmy(t•c•w) 13:25, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Support I completely trust Brian and am confident in his ability to carry out the required tasks. Adambro (talk) 15:13, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Support Long time user, and trusted. rootology (T) 15:26, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  22. Support Of course Naerii (talk) 16:27, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  23. Support Yep - David Gerard (talk) 18:29, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Support Sure, I have experience with him from other wikis and no problems. Cbrown1023 talk 18:46, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  25. Support Durova (talk) 01:27, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  26. Sympathy Support because your Rugby team sucks... ;-) giggy (:O) 05:02, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  27. Support, I concur with Giggy! John Vandenberg (talk) 06:04, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  28. Support --Nzgabriel | Talk 08:34, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  29. Support per just about everything already said. Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 02:16, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  30. Support - Has my full support and confidence, has had for years. - Amgine | t 03:54, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  31. Support Jacques Divol (talk) 20:15, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  32. Support per my vote for Brianmc.--Poetlister (talk) 12:04, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for checkuser rights. Please do not modify it.

Skenmy (Paul Williams)

I would like to nominate Skenmy as an additional checkuser. He is one of the newly elected ArbCom members, I believe already identified to the Foundation, and as I said when voting to support his ArbCom membership, mature beyond his years. I have every reason to believe that he has the best interests of the project at heart, as well as the technical knowledge to interpret CU results and take appropriate action. I trust him to keep up to date with the checkuser mailing list and block open proxies as they are discovered, as well as share findings from locally prompted checkusers with the list as an aid to keeping cross-wiki vandalism under control. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Skenmy, do you accept this nomination? --Brian McNeil / talk 09:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I accept this nomination --Skenmy(t•c•w) 10:07, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Comment As an aside I would like to thank the various stewards and CUs from other projects who have rallied round and endorsed myself and BrianNZ. If you want to be utterly cynical about it, they simply don't want to see the required work land in their in-tray.
Moving on from that, I would again urge these people (Stewards, non-en.wn CheckUsers) to support Skenmy's candidacy. I feel that the wide community support given in the below votes clearly demonstrates that this candidate has the community's endorsement and trust. I would hate to see him lose out on a technicality. --Brian McNeil / talk 11:58, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  1. Support as nom, and assuming user accepts. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support per nom. --Herby talk thyme 10:25, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support per nom Anonymous101talk 10:31, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Support per nom. Cirt (talk) 12:19, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Support --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 12:38, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Support Majorly (talk) 14:39, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Support A great trusted contributor who I'm sure can assist the project further using checkuser. Adambro (talk) 15:13, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support Long time user, and trusted. Strength of nom. rootology (T) 15:27, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support As per Rootology. Naerii (talk) 16:28, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support Yep - David Gerard (talk) 18:29, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Support I guessssssssss so. --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 18:57, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Support - passes the CU age requirement criteria just barely and apart from that his experience on this wiki is excellent.. :) ..--Cometstyles 00:25, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Support - Congratulations, Skenmy. I didn't have franchise for your other election but I've probably written enough Wikinews articles to support you here. Best regards, Durova (talk) 01:25, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Support Having three CUs is probably a good idea, just in case one of them gets run over by a rogue bracket. GreenReaper (talk) 01:27, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  15. I am not excessively active on Wikinews but I do edit occcassionally and read a fair bit. Feel free to not count this vote if it goes against any local policies for activity. Support. giggy (:O) 04:55, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  16. Support Trusted locally, and has two other local checkusers to work with on the hairy cases. John Vandenberg (talk) 06:12, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Support Again, another person who I do not doubt is trustworthy and a good person to use the tools wisely. Mike Halterman (talk) 07:40, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  18. Support Can be trusted with the extra tools. --Kanonkas (talk) 10:47, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  19. Support Skenmy is clearly a capable admin, and I trust Brian's statement that he can handle the technical side of checkuser tools as well as the procedural side. Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 02:12, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Support DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 02:33, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Support Sorry to get in so late on this. I have been mostly away from my computer for the weekend, and when I have been present, it's been involved in some other checkuser vote drama. Skenmy has my full support (and since he ran for board, he's identified). Cary Bass (talk) 16:18, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Abstain Although I support this user as a Check User, I'm not sure if the MWF policy requires age of legal majority in the nation of residence. If legal majority is required, I'm not sure if the user would then qualify. (Am interested in changing my abstention to support following clarification by MWF legal team.) - Amgine | t 03:58, 4 August 2008 (UTC)striking as per original abstention, will vote support) - Amgine | t 02:54, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    Paul is over 18, age of majority in the UK. Admittedly, not by much, but he is. If memory serves, he is also on OTRS and the criteria are basically the same. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:06, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I know of one other checkuser on another project in the UK who is the same age as Skenmy (e.g., over 18). I believe, as the Foundation, we've addressed this matter. Cary Bass (talk) 17:54, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  22. Support Jacques Divol (talk) 20:14, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  23. Support - Having my only minor concern cleared up, full support and confidence in this user. - Amgine | t 02:54, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Support. --Jcart1534 (talk) 10:44, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  25. Support per my vote for Brianmc. He may be less experienced than the others, but I do not see that as fatal.--Poetlister (talk) 12:04, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  26. Support I have had various experiences with this user before and believe them to be a trustworthy member who would use the tools well. TheFearow (userpage) 09:47, 8 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Bastique

If you don't know who this is, get out of here or get an education! --Brian McNeil / talk 19:46, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Up, wow. I'd love to be an admin :) Cary Bass (talk) 19:52, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Votes

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Cspurrier (Craig Spurrier)

I would like to nominate Cspurrier for Checkuser access rights. He is already identified, as a Steward, and was recently reelected to the Wikinews Arbitration Committee. He is also an administrator and bureaucrat. Adminship RfA, Bureaucrat nom discussion. He has served us well in the past when he was previously a checkuser locally on this project and I have confidence he will continue to do so. Cirt (talk) 15:44, 9 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Do you accept this nomination? Cirt (talk) 15:44, 9 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes,thanks--Cspurrier (talk) 15:45, 9 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Votes

  1. Support as nom. Cirt (talk) 15:44, 9 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support per nom. Anonymous101talk 15:49, 9 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support experienced user, both with Wikinews and the CU tools. --Skenmy talk 16:17, 9 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Rock on! :) Thunderhead 08:08, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Cabal support - all wikis need a steward in their arbcom and he is one of the best ...--Cometstyles 09:41, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Support I'd be hard pressed to name someone more obviously capable and deserving of the tools. Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 12:14, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  7. Support Had checkuser before, no problems with him having again. Majorly talk 14:03, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  8. Support Lysy (talk) 11:00, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Support (tempted to say per Cometstyles ). Bawolff ☺☻ 11:04, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  10. Support It's Craig Spurrier! --SVTCobra 23:40, 12 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  11. Support The Mind's Eye (talk) 01:17, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  12. Support Full faith and support, has had for years, etc. ad nauseum. - Amgine | t 03:41, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Support Daniel (talk) 05:32, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Support Jacques Divol (talk) 07:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  15. Support You can haz support --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 01:13, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  16. Support Of course. Cary Bass (talk) 02:03, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Support (for what it's worth as a somewhat active reader). Giggy (talk) 10:50, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  18. Support Best wishes, Durova (talk) 03:08, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  19. Support from the cross-Wiki bureaucrat mafia.--Poetlister 21:14, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Support -- IlyaHaykinson (talk) 08:27, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Support. --Jcart1534 (talk) 10:53, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  22. Support Adambro (talk) 11:51, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  23. Support Yup, this one seems pretty obvious Gopher65talk 15:36, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  24. Support --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 18:24, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  25. Support --+Deprifry+ 22:52, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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September 2008

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Dan100

Hello, I'd like my admin rights back please. Nobody contacted me about the "deadminship" process despite the socking great notice about how to contact me on my user page, plus the "deadminship" thing doesn't even seem to be policy. Dan100 (Talk) 21:09, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Votes

Closed Unfortunately this did not pass. --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 20:00, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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ShakataGaNai ‎

User is very active on Wikinews and can definitely be trusted. First edit 5 June 2008 and user became active in July. Twice todays he has asked me to perform an admin action, so he clearly has a need for the tools. Also, ShakataGaNai is a commons admin and an accredited reporter. Anonymous101talk 19:45, 15 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

AWB has come a long way since I wrote those parts of WN:ARCHIVE. There are certain aspects of the process could be carried out with it (eg getting rid of stupid MS Word quotemarks and fixing spelling) but I strongly suspect a final once-through with a regular browser would still be required. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:24, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Someone should create a dedicated reviewer barnstar for this user. --Brian McNeil / talk 08:03, 18 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I gave him The Invisible Barnstar. :P -- Cirt (talk) 08:15, 18 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

Closed Hey! I haz admin! --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 19:58, 22 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Skenmy (Bureaucrat)

Skenmy (talk · contribs) is already a trusted sysop, checkuser, and member of the Arbitration Committee. I think he will do fine as a bureaucrat and ask the community to weigh in. We could use some help here at WN:RFP, as well as at WN:CHU and WN:BOTS. Thanks, Cirt (talk) 11:28, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

Just like a marriage proposal, I do. --Skenmy talk 11:30, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
These need to be investigated and sorted. If we can consolidate bots and find one that does the lot it would be easier, but liaising with the bot owners is probably a good first step. --Skenmy talk 14:10, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Comment -- It has been over 7 days since this RfB discussion started, and it has a majority of support consensus. I think it can be closed as successful and the candidate promoted. Cirt (talk) 04:49, 5 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

Closed as Passed --Chiacomo (talk) 05:40, 5 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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October 2008

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PatrickFlaherty

PatrickFlaherty (talk · contribs) has been a steadfast positive contributor for the last four months now, and became an accredited reporter on 12 October 2008. He has written (14) solid articles on topics relating to finance, and also helps out with reviews. I believe he would continue to contribute positively to the project in his role as administrator. Cirt (talk) 18:40, 28 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

Comments

Votes

Closed as Passed --Brian McNeil / talk 09:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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November 2008

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Durova

Durova (talk · contribs) has been a steadfast positive contributor for the last nine months now, and she has written (19) articles on topics relating to healthcare and science research, helped out with four articles in other areas, and also helps out with reviews. The Meta-Wiki project she has spearheaded, WikiVoices, has brought in new contributors to Wikinews. She is an administrator on Wikimedia Commons and on Wikisource and an OTRS volunteer, and I believe Durova would continue to contribute positively to Wikinews in her role as sysop on this project. Cirt (talk) 23:10, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

Hmm, no interesting questions... I'll take this opportunity to contribute to wikinews in a non-useful manner ;). Bawolff ☺☻ 03:50, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • On the vote to start the Wikinews project, a famous Wikipedian said, "Would I ever vote against world domination?". Do you believe Wikinews should take over the world? (bonus points if you can tell me who said that)
  • If Wikinews took over the world, and ruled everybody's life, what would the meaning of Wikinews be?
    • Follow up: if Wikinews took over the world, and ruled everybody's life, would I still be a wikiholic?

Answers:

  1. Yes, absolutely. (Jimbo. No. 16.[4])
  2. Forty-two.
  3. Would you? Dunno. I can quit anytime I like.

Durova (talk) 04:24, 7 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • I want to also comment on this, now that I've been thinking about it a bit longer; that Durova has an enormous amount of energy, and she is also a good motivator for others. I love Wikinews and I'm sad that I can't spread my time around devoting more energy to this project; and for me, I can see this project only getting better with Durova on board as an admin. Plus, she's a girl and we need more girls. Cary Bass (talk) 23:39, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Votes

  • Support previous vote struck, I think if those who support (myself included) help mentor Durova then there will be little in the way of problems. Comments below indicate a willingness to learn. --Brian McNeil / talk 17:33, 10 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
She's gained experience in many varied areas of the project, and a few posts to Water Cooler show a drive to interact positively with the community. I highly doubt this would have any bearing on her actions as a sysop - quite the opposite - it demonstrates a willingness to seek out discussion with other users. It is certainly a bit difficult to learn one's way around on this project - note it was three tries before anyone gave her feedback on that. Cirt (talk) 23:29, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
She did not know that the place to seek admin help is WN:AAA. I expect that as a minimum for any candidate. --Brian McNeil / talk 23:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I am sure that a simple polite post from yourself for her to do that in the future would have been all it would have taken. This project is not that user-friendly in helping people find their way around - and surely someone who has already displayed qualities of both being able to bring in new users and also experienced users from other projects, and a strong capability to listen to others and solicit input, help, opinions and advice from more experienced users, is someone that will be level-headed and do well as a sysop. Cirt (talk) 23:52, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You misunderstand my reasoning, why I do not know. I am opposed because the user is not familiar enough with the project, not used to tagging things they'd speedy as {{delete}}, and didn't know where the local equivalent of the administrators' noticeboard was. Durova also seems "casually active", something which influences me little but raises concerns that she may not learn where things are without more time applied to the project. Wiki experience elsewhere should not factor in here, it helps as a contributor but not necessarily as an administrator. --Brian McNeil / talk 23:59, 5 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My above rationale stands, but also I think Cary Bass summed it up pretty well in his Support comment, below. Cirt (talk) 00:06, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In an effort to prove myself wrong I will say, "You're never content unless you get the last word". --Brian McNeil / talk 00:11, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Brian, you raise a worthwhile concern. Please note that documentation at WN:AAA is actually a bit thin with regard to speedy deletions. I've had that page on my watchlist for a while, yet from reading its sections had been under the impression it was primarily used for requests to edit protected pages, 3RR alerts, and unblock requests. Perhaps it would be a good idea to update and make the page clearer? I'll be sure to use it for this intended purpose in the future; please extend a little leniency about using another one for a few days before receiving a direction that wasn't clear on the desired page itself. Durova (talk) 01:26, 6 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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ShakataGaNai

Case justification

I am Rschen7754, an admin for 2.5 years at the English Wikipedia and a confirmed user here at Wikinews (I did stuff relating to the US election). I indefinitely blocked a user known as Freewayguy at the English Wikipedia. This user has gone to Wikimedia sites that I edit and don't edit and made death threats against me - so much so that my username was added to the new page title blacklist by the stewards. He has been blocked on several wikis indefinitely (including commons, english, simple english, spanish, meta, italian, japanese, korean, chinese, german, whatever nl stands for...). This (NSFW) has the gory details.

That all to say that User:Freewayguy hit here tonight. I went into #wikinews and asked for an admin to indefinitely block this guy. ShakataGaNai was extremely rude and only blocked for 72 hours. I told him to look at the global contributions list, and he blatantly refused to do so several times. I was then blocked from the channel. User:Daniel, another administrator, is able to confirm this (as he talked to this user personally), as may others who can view channel logs of the channel at the time. Those in #wikipedia-en-admins may be able to confirm this as well through secondhand knowledge.

I don't know what the standards here are for adminship; I do know that this may have resulted in loss of sysop status at the English Wikipedia - and we don't even have a page for this. This user was extremely incivil and would not take input. Blocking me from the IRC channel for making the request for the blocking admin to look at global contribs was way out of line. This user has been making death threats against me; the fact that this user could not (and has not) been blocked indefinitely is despicable. --Rschen7754 (talk) 08:37, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Comment - I was not on IRC at the time so I cannot speak to what happened there (I am not even sure if we could take formal actions on-wiki based on something that happened on IRC). But perhaps Daniel (talk · contribs) could comment on this. I extended the block on Freewayguy (talk · contribs) to indef, based on vandalism, socking, and intimidating behavior/harassment on this project, in addition to this history of cross-wiki intimidation and harassment. I do not think ShakataGaNai (talk · contribs) should be desysopped based on the evidence in front of me, which is only the stuff that has happened on-wiki itself. Cirt (talk) 09:02, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Death threats should be taken up with civil authorities (i.e. police). en.WP checkusers will generally handle issues like this and pass sensitive information on for you, in some cases their judgement will be to take it up with the abusive user's ISP and get them warned/disconnected.
I can make no comment on the IRC discussion, I did not see it, but your comment indicates you persisted in demanding your chosen action be the one taken. If that was seen as being disruptive, I would expect you to be booted/banned. Incidentally, actions on IRC have absolutely zero bearing on the wiki. It is not an official WMF communications channel, and thus calling for de-sysop based on comments or actions there is pointless. de-sysop can only be based upon actions on this wiki. You have shown no evidence to support your crusade. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:29, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I was asking him to look at some evidence across Wikimedia - a reasonable request. I don't see the problem with that. --Rschen7754 (talk) 09:43, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • If it amounted to asking for someone to be persecuted for actions elsewhere then it is, in my opinion, a form of vendetta. Many users find they don't fit in on one project but can move to another and be productive. You certainly would not be happy were I to take your actions here as justification to call for you to be desysopped on en.wp, and I see little difference between that and what you're doing here. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:48, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • Uh, he (Freewayguy) made death threats against me. Every other wiki he did this on indefinitely blocked him. Also, some (Simple and test) indefinitely banned him even though he did nothing wrong there simply due to what he did on other sites. Considering that he did make threats on Wikinews... --Rschen7754 (talk) 09:56, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
          • This discussion isn't about Freewayguy, and I'm not going to be distracted by that anymore. I looked at the global contributions and didn't see one credible death threat, just a messed up young kid being a dick. So, state your case against ShakataGaNai or I will delete this RfDA as a waste of the Wikinews community's time. Hint: You're supposed to provide proof of abuse of admin privileges. --Brian McNeil / talk 10:14, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
            • Making poor judgment calls can be grounds for desysopping as well. This was a bad call. Admins are supposed to be civil to the community - this one clearly wasn't. I gave the simple request for him to look at global contribs - he said he didn't need to. Nobody has addressed my concern regarding that. --Rschen7754 (talk) 10:19, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
              • He didn't need to; he's a volunteer like the rest of us. Doing harm on the project may be grounds for desysopping. Failing to do enough good (not failing to do any good, but doing less than enough good) is not grounds for desysopping. I imagine he didn't feel like investigating any further, and that's okay; you can ask someone who is willing to investigate further. Editors are valued for the work that they do choose to do. You can't force a volunteer to act. Sorry. WODUP 11:11, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
                • When you block someone, you take responsibility for the block. Failure to evaluate a block you just made is a serious concern. Being careful when you block and not looking at all the evidence is a serious concern. Moreover, admins are allowed to make mistakes (I've made several!) but not being willing to correct them is a serious concern. --Rschen7754 (talk) 11:34, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • ←When you block, you take responsibility for that block, absolutely. In this situation, it was a good block, but one that should have been set not to expire. Failure to re-evaluate a block is serious, yes, but I haven't seen anything to suggest that ShakataGaNai refused to re-evaluate the situation. I don't know what was said on IRC, but this edit shows me that ShakataGaNai was at least willing to review the user's behavior after the block expired and indef block then if necessary. As for looking at all of the evidence, I don't know what ShakataGaNai saw that made him know that a block was justified, but I assume that when he saw that there was enough to warrant a block, he blocked. That's it. This goes back to ShakataGaNai possibly not doing enough, but he hasn't abused the tools. Thankfully, absolute perfection isn't a requirement to be a sysop as I've made a few mistakes on enwiki, too. Your last sentence implies that ShakataGaNai wasn't willing to correct this mistake of underblocking the user, but doesn't allow for the possibility that he didn't see it as a mistake. If he didn't (absent evidence to the contrary, I'm assuming good faith), given the harassment and threats, I would see that as a lapse in judgement, but this one incident doesn't warrant desysopping; admins are allowed to make mistakes every now and then, but consistently poor judgement is how to lose the bit. Lastly, I'll note that your complaint was that the block wasn't long enough, that the offending user wasn't going to harm anything for three days, and that there would have been plenty of time during those three days to bring it to WN:AAA. From what I've seen, ShakataGaNai should not be desysopped. WODUP 16:30, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Hello. Like Rschen7754, I am more of a Wikipedian than a Wikinewsie, but I do have an opinion here. I don't see how the behavior Rschen7754 described (rudeness on IRC and banning from a channel) would result in a desysopping on enwiki like xe says it may. Add to that the fact that actions on IRC usually don't have consequences on wiki and that ShakataGaNai did at least block the user, and I can't conclude that the user should lose the bit. Also, it should at least be noted that User:Freewayguy has now been blocked indef. WODUP 09:37, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I just spotted all the activity on this page in RC so thought I'd take a look. As others have noted, there isn't a great deal on Wiki to suggest this user should have their admin rights removed. However, I would most definitely strongly disagree with the comments by Brianmc and DragonFire1024 which seem to completely dismiss the behaviour of users on IRC as being relevant to whether they should have admin rights on Wikinews. We don't give users admin rights simply because they can press buttons, we do so because we trust their judgement. If, as is being suggested, this user has simply ignored suggestions and acted inappropriate in booting someone from IRC then this has to be taken into account in assessing their judgement. The removal of admin rights is simply based upon community consensus. There is no requirement that only on Wiki actions have to be taken into account and nor should there be. It is perfectly possible for a Wikinews admin to harm the project by bringing it into disrepute or whatever without doing anything on Wiki. That doesn't mean they shouldn't loose their admin rights. Not having being in the IRC channel however means it isn't possible for me to comment as to whether the users actions should result in their admin rights being removed. I would welcome the publication of any IRC logs that are available though. IRC logs being kept private only serves to protect the guilty, it doesn't benefit the community as whole. I am slightly disappointed at the way in which Rschen7754's concerns have been branded a "crusade". Adambro (talk) 12:52, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree to some extent. But IRC is not WN, just like WN is not WP. The actions of users in IRC usually does not reflect their actions on Wiki. With that said, we really cannot force anyone on IRC to follow or abide by the policies of WN on IRC. We just have to assume good faith. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 13:03, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    As you note, what people are prepared to say on IRC is different from what they are prepared to say on Wiki. Ultimately though, unless people are trying to claim to not be those chatting on IRC under their Wiki username, they are still the same person and I cannot possibly agree that the community shouldn't be able to judge an admin by their comments on IRC. Whenever and wherever someone identifying themselves as a Wikinews admin comments, there is the potential to bring Wikinews into disrepute and so all Wikinews admins, and other users for that matter, have a responsibility to behave in an appropriate manner elsewhere. If they fail to do so then I don't wish for them to be associated with Wikinews in such an obvious way as adminship. No one should feel untouchable simply because they don't actually behave inappropriate on Wiki. You don't suddenly stop being a Wikinews admin when you're not on Wikinews. Adambro (talk) 13:28, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    After a session on IRC this morning I expect IRC logs to demonstrate that Rschen7754 was being irritating and pestering about what I consider a perfectly reasonable decision. I note Rschen7754 hasn't given permission for his side of the IRC logs to be released per my request. --Brian McNeil / talk 14:47, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • If Freewayguy is such a problem across many Wikis and issuing death threats, why wasn't a global block requested? --SVTCobra 15:29, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I have never heard of anyone at enwikipedia being desysoped for being rude and/or banning someone from a channel on IRC. That's simply not true. File a Request for Comment or something else, but this is just ridiculous. Cary Bass (talk) 16:57, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • This silly frankly. However, the disturbance on Wikinews started when 75.47.208.145 began removing legitimate edits made by Freeway guy and issuing block warnings and demanding, without explanation, a block of a user who was in good standing on Wikinews. I do not know if that IP was Rschen7754, but the IP was name dropping (see diff). It is no wonder that ShakataGaNai may been a bit impatient or even discourteous on IRC, given the rude way Wikinews was introduced to problems with Freewayguy. There is a right way to notify Wikinews of potential cross-wiki problem users, and the way this was done was not the right way. A simple note on WN:AAA would have sufficed. --SVTCobra 18:05, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Actually I thought 75.47.208.145 was Rschen at first. It wasn't until much later after much digging that I realized there were 3 IP's from 75.47.X.X involved with this user. Though at the time, "Rschen" was on (IRC) from another IP address all together (in fact through WebIRC). I had no way to verify who any of the IP's were (or if they were the same user) other than the IRC IP and the on wiki IP were both EXTREMELY persistent. In fact the first time I got confirmation that he was _actually_ involved was when he post the request for de-sysop. (Note: No for defense, just explaining what I saw) --ShakataGaNai ^_^ 18:18, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Looking at everything, I think it might be best to bring this issue to the Arbitration Committee. There is several issues here: First, several IPs were essentially harassing Freeway. Second, Freeway's comments on Rschen7754. Thirdly, the IRC conversation. Lastly, we have this request, which in my mind is petty and could be a form of harassment on Rschen7754's part. --PatrickFlaherty (talk) 18:31, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • This is someone I've encountered on en:wiki who has problems with communication skills and is generally difficult to deal with. 72 hours isn't something I'd overturn for a first instance. If the problem recurs in this manner, wouldn't cut much slack. Durova (talk) 19:43, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • As a colleague of Rschen7754 on enwp, let me lay out the situation as I understand it:
    • The 75 IP is a persistent anon user that has edited enwp for quite a while. Recently he was blocked by me for a couple months for incivility but has been evading the block and so the timer has been reset several times. As far as is officially known the 75 IP is not related to any other established account on Wikipedia (he has started his own accounts to circumvent the block, though).
    • Freewayguy is an editor on Wikipedia whose poor grammar and carelessness with regard to facts served as a net deficit to enwp. In other words, he didn't officially violate any policy, but we discussed things with some uninvolved admins, and all agreed that the amount of time it takes to clean up after his article-space contributions was too great as to warrant him still being on enwp. Rschen and I asked him to clean up his act and warned him. When Freewayguy persisted in editing and introducing new errors into the encyclopedia, Rschen blocked him. Upon review 3 uninvolved admins upheld the block.
    • Freewayguy then began editing other wikis, starting at commons and expanding to other language Wikipedias, editing his own and Rschen's userpages with the death threats and general nonsense. I personally thought most of it was amusing, but Rschen is treating it more seriously, because he lives in a county neighboring that of Freewayguy. I believe the proximity between the two editors is why Rschen is playing it safe and taking things seriously. Scott5114 (talk) 20:05, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - After looking at the logs posted by ShakataGaNai (talk · contribs) I can understand if SGN got a bit annoyed at Rschen7754 (talk · contribs) for his lack of patience and over-persistence in IRC. Probably Rschen7754 should have dealt with this more formally instead of IRC - contacting a steward, and privately emailing a local checkuser to this project. I don't see anything blatantly wrong done by SGN, though perhaps he could have just given Rschen7754 advice to do that - seek out a steward or en.wikinews checkuser to email privately about it. But certainly no grounds for desysop based on what is there in the logs. Cirt (talk) 21:33, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - Further, we now have (7) unanimous people weighing in as "Oppose" for this proposal of desysopping - perhaps it would be best at this point in time to close this discussion a bit early? Cirt (talk) 21:35, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. This bullshit has wasted enough of people's time and attracted anonymous trolls from Wikipedia. A block on a /16 had to be instituted because of the fight being imported from Wikipedia. --Brian McNeil / talk 21:41, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Wow. Some thoughts and opinions on this
    • Actions have a very limited impact on your status on wikinews. If someone is doing something stupid on 'pedia, and comes over here, we'll going to watch them more closely, but it is doubtful we will block them unless they are doing something extremly stupid
      • Death threats are an example of something extremly stupid. It may warrent an automatic block here, but should be investigated before hand and disscussed to make sure that they are the same person, etc. This is something that should be formly brought up with administrators, not casually on irc
    • Actions of admins on other places do affect what happens to them on wikinews, if it relates to wikinews or you're threatening a wikinewsie. (per BP) + It seems common sense if admins are bashing wikinews, etc outside wikinews, thats not good
      • Therefor if you are being extremely stupid outside of wikinews [which includes irc], it will catch up to you here, but you have to so something very very stupid
    • demanding an admin do something is just generally not a good idea. If you believe an admin has not given you proper attention, ask someone else to review
    • We don't de-admin people for not doing enough. We really, as a general rule, do not deadmin people. You'd have a case if the admin was making the death threats, but saying that the admin did not do enough, when your side of the story is disputed, is not going to work unless you have a really good case [which you don't]
    • You have been very agressive in demanding this [based on your comments here] which counts against you.

Bawolff ☺☻ 21:46, 21 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by administrator in question

Votes

Note that support indicates you agree the administrator should lose their privileges. Oppose means you believe they should retain them.

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.


December 2008

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a request for adminship that was withdrawn by the candidate. Please do not modify it.

Tempodivalse (talk · contribs)

Want to see if I can get into this early. I know I've been here for only three weeks, but I have amassed over 1300 edits since then, about 900 of which are in the main article namespace, a number that is higher than that of some administrators. I also have 3500 edits at the English Wikipedia, and have been there for half a year. I thought that I could simplify things a bit if I had sysop status (if elected, I'd mainly do things like correcting mistakes in archived pages, tackling the archive backlog, and deleting nonsense pages). Thoughts? ♪TempoDiValse♪ 17:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

I think that's already answered in the nom. --SVTCobra 18:12, 9 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Just to clarify, yes, I will help out with those things. ♪TempoDiValse♪ 18:40, 9 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Okay thanks. :) Cirt (talk) 19:07, 9 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Votes

NOMINATION WITHDRAWN I'll try again in a month or two. ♪TempoDiValse♪ 15:28, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Closed as withdrawn by the candidate. Cirt (talk) 21:15, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it.. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

Gopher65

Gopher65 (talk · contribs) has been a great contributor to Wikinews since July. He has made over 1100 edits since then and does just about everything including copyediting, reviewing, adding new materials to developing articles, and is also a great reviewer. Gopher65 has created several articles but also has been involved in template designs. I believe the project would benefit by having Gopher65 as an admin. --PatrickFlaherty (talk) 00:20, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Questions

Comments

Votes

Closed PASS out the mop and bucket. --Brian McNeil / talk 15:59, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of the Admin's page or the talk page of the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.


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