User:Pete.Hurd/RfA review

Welcome to the Question phase of RfA Review. We hope you'll take the time to respond to your questions in order to give us further understanding of what you think of the RfA process. Remember, there are no right or wrong answers here. Also, feel free to answer as many questions as you like. Don't feel you have to tackle everything if you don't want to.

In a departure from the normal support and oppose responses, this review will focus on your thoughts, opinions and concerns. Where possible, you are encouraged to provide examples, references, diffs and so on in order to support your viewpoint. Please note that at this point we are not asking you to recommend possible remedies or solutions for any problems you describe, as that will come later in the review.

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Questions

When thinking about the adminship process, what are your thoughts and opinions about the following areas:

Candidate selection (inviting someone to stand as a candidate)
I think this is currently being conducted in a very reasonable manner. I think this part works well.
Administrator coaching (either formally or informally)
I've never been a fan of this. I see the critical abilities of an admin as being: 1) possessing common sense, a knowledge of what an encyclopedia is, and experience in using tertiary references in the real world, 2) understanding of the ways and traditions of wikipedia to the point that they can implement them, even in cases where they disagree with them (with the expectation that they will disagree in appropriate venues and seek to change ways through consensus before implementing their own vision through propaganda-by-deed). I don't see how coaching can impart common sense, or an intuitive understanding of wikipedia's functioning. At worst, coaching acts to conceal problems from attention at RfA. I must admit that when I see mention of admin coaching at an RfA I immediately think less of the candidate.
Nomination, co-nomination and self-nomination (introducing the candidate)
I think nominators statements have been showing a tendency toward becoming longer than I think they ought to be. I view this a very very minor problem, and probably driven by a desire to refute anticipated objections. RfA !voter behaviour is more likely the root cause of this inflation. I am not at all troubled by the pro-forma opposes to self-noms. While I disagree with that position, I disagree far more with those who seem determined to stop such expression of opinion. I really cannot imagine how to improve this part of the process, other than changing the manner in which opinions are expressed and debated (largely within the "oppose" section).
Advertising and canvassing
Clearly canvassing one's usual supporters subverts the democratic feel of the process, but given the debating, not-voting intention of the process this ought not to pose a problem in the ideal form of wikipedian decision making. However, RfA has a stronger vote counting flavour to it than most other debates... It is reasonable to assume that some form of off-wiki canvassing is very common, but I think it is right that evidence of soliciting supporters during an RfA is viewed so negatively. I see a line somewhere between "hey, here's an email to let you know that I decided to go for the mop afterall" and "hey, Buddy is up for RfA, pass it on to the crew before the haterz show up". It would be nice to think that WP:BN/R is all that is needed, perhaps this information resource could be advertised in some way, other than that I don't see advertising and canvassing as a critical issue.
Debate (Presenting questions to the candidate)
I think this is beginning to get out of hand. There are clearly cases in which candidates need to be asked questions, and I would be loathe to dissuade people from asking pertinent questions, but... I get the impression with a significant minority of "optional" questions to the candidate that many RfA !voters have quirky single issue litmus test questions that suggest they are not evaluating candidates on the breadth of their potential value as administrators, but by focussing on the minutae of one very specific topic which an otherwise worthy candidate may be educated on in post-election training.
Election (including providing reasons for support/oppose)
I would like to see some effort made to increase the signal to noise ratio here. Clearly, commentless opposes are of little value, but lengthy paragraphs with multiple lengthy paragraph responses rebuttals and 3rd party opines are far from rare. I would hope that some sort of way to encourage summary of reasons for oppose into a more terse format (while more strongly encouraging the use of diffs) might be found. I realize that we aren't going to come up with a CSD-like classification system (e.g. "oppose per RfA-G1: editor is patently nonsenical [diff1] [diff2]") but wouldn't it be nice...
Withdrawal (the candidate withdrawing from the process)
I'm not sure what this question is asking. Candidates ought to be able to withdraw whenever they choose to. On the flipside, I understand Kelly Martin's disappointment at having her last RfA snowball closed. It clearly didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of passing (and so I understand why it was snowballed), but if it was her desire to hear everyone's criticism in that venue, then I think she ought to have been allowed to let it run, for all the drama it might have attracted.
Declaration (the bureaucrat closing the application. Also includes WP:NOTNOW closes)
Ambivalent about NOTNOW, see above... Think bcrats work is done superbly.
Training (use of New Admin School, other post-election training)
I would not like to see this be made mandatory, I have not read any of this material and cannot comment on it's quality. I seem to remember that (at least in late 2005) newly minted admins were expected to read WP:ARL...
Recall (the Administrators Open to Recall process)
I don't see this working, it might be and I havn't noticed. I have formed the opinion (as I sure every other regular has) that there are a fair number of dunderheads among the ranks of the admins. 1) I get the strong impression that each of these has enough support that de-sysopping through some reverse RfA would not work and 2) that thanks to the semi-organized chaos of wikiprocess, dunderhead admins really pose no great threat to the project. While I might occasionally wish there were a speedier route to de-sysopping than Arbcom, I really don't believe that having such a process would improve the encyclopedia. I think it would just ratchet-up the background drama level.

When thinking about adminship in general, what are your thoughts and opinions about the following areas:

How do you view the role of an administrator?
An admin is a user trusted with tools that could be potentially harmful to the project if given to all. Being given these tools, they have an implied duty to them make use of them.
What attributes do you feel an administrator should possess?
An admin should use their tools to apply the consensus of the wikipedian community before the wikipedian community needs to weigh in to an administrative matter. An admin ought then to explain their actions to those affected in a manner most likely to instill understanding, such that further administrative action is less likely to be needed in the future.

Finally, when thinking about Requests for Adminship:

Have you ever voted in a request for Adminship? If so what was your experience?
Yes, a great many times. My experience has been positive. When candidates I have opposed have succeeded I have nonetheless considered the process to be largely reasonable. I understand why people at RfA think differently from me...
Have you ever stood as a candidate under the Request for Adminship process? If so what was your experience?
No. Over the years I have been invited by many wikipedians that I respect to stand for Adminship, and frankly, I have been put off by the RfA process.
Do you have any further thoughts or opinions on the Request for Adminship process?
I wish I could explain better the contrasting feelings I have to the two items above. I think the tone of debate within the oppose section is the problem, but I can't really put my finger on how to fix it, other than I wish people would think more and type less.

Once you're finished...

Thank you again for taking part in this review of the Request for Adminship process. Now that you've completed the questionnaire, don't forget to add the following line of code to the bottom of the Response page by clicking this link and copying the following to the BOTTOM of the list.

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This question page was generated by {{RFAReview}} at 03:51 on 25 June 2008.