On Wed, May 26, 2010 at 4:34 PM, David Goodman dgoodma...@gmail.com wrote:
Are you saying that a _declining_ number of administrators means a
_growth_ in bureaucracy? It would normally mean the opposite, either
a loss of control, or that the ordinary members were taking the
function upon
On Tue, 01 Jun 2010 10:18:03 -0400, Abd wrote:
Durova's history is a classic example. She was hounded by a screaming
mob when she made a mistake, even though she recognized the error and
undid it within an hour.
I might well be counted as part of that screaming mob since I was
one of the
As usual, I recommend not reading this if allergic to Abd Thought.
Some of you are. Consult your physician.
At 08:37 AM 6/3/2010, Daniel R. Tobias wrote:
On Tue, 01 Jun 2010 10:18:03 -0400, Abd wrote:
Durova's history is a classic example. She was hounded by a screaming
mob when she made a
On Tue, Jun 1, 2010 at 8:17 AM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote:
I'm not a moderator, but I've just been skipping those long posts.
They are annoying, but I may one day read those posts if I have
nothing better to do, and sometimes there is something interesting in
there.
I
On 2 June 2010 20:46, quiddity pandiculat...@gmail.com wrote:
So /That's/ why we're so busy, and feel so alone sometimes!! :P
The busy policy talkpages, really (really) need regular input from the
old guard.
Watch[list]ful vigilance, is the still the best way to understand, and
influence,
David Lindsey wrote:
What we need, then, is not a way to desysop more easily, but rather a way to
delineate highly-charged and controversial administrator actions, and the
administrators qualified to perform them, from uncontroversial administrator
actions, and the administrators qualified to
On 1 June 2010 05:56, Durova nadezhda.dur...@gmail.com wrote:
Let's not mince words: Wikipedia administratorship can be a serious
liability. The 'reward' for volunteering for this educational nonprofit can
include getting one's real name Googlebombed, getting late night phone calls
to one's
On 31 May 2010 20:00, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
Interesting, AGK. Are the ideas important, or the personalities?
Here, you just demonstrated my concern even further.
Now I understand why you are able to write at such length. Rather than
make your arguments based on facts,
Again, this gets long. If allergic to Abd Thought, or to lengthy
comments, please don't read. Nobody is required to read this, it's
voluntary, and you won't hear a complaint from me if you don't read it.
Actually, the mail triggered moderation, the list is set to 20 KB
max, which is low in my
(continuation from Part 1, preceding.)
I never sought the desysopping of JzG, as an example, and didn't
argue for it for WMC. I argued for *suspension* until the admin
assured ArbComm that he would not repeat the use of tools while
involved. JzG's actions had been egregious, and still ArbComm
Procedural note to moderators: Perhaps it is time to consider a length
limit on posting?
Risker
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On 1 June 2010 14:30, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
Therefore, instead of only needing to skip one mail, you'll need to
skip two. This is part one.
Abd, have you ever considered opening a blog? :)
You could write the lengthy version of your comments on various topics
in a
At 12:56 AM 6/1/2010, Durova wrote:
Let's not mince words: Wikipedia administratorship can be a serious
liability. The 'reward' for volunteering for this educational nonprofit can
include getting one's real name Googlebombed, getting late night phone calls
to one's home, and worse. The Wikimedia
Risker wrote:
Procedural note to moderators: Perhaps it is time to consider a length
limit on posting?
While I understand where you are coming from, it bears noting
that some people would like a limit of length both on the short
and the long side, and you would in the eyes of some, fail on
At 09:07 AM 6/1/2010, David Gerard wrote:
On 1 June 2010 05:56, Durova nadezhda.dur...@gmail.com wrote:
[...] It is hardly surprising that, in this weak economy, wise
editors have been declining offers of nomination.
This is IMO asymptom of there being insufficient admins.
Yes.
And again,
On 1 June 2010 15:45, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen cimonav...@gmail.com wrote:
I don't actually agree with Sue on that particular summary being
all that insightful. (Sorry Greg!) But a lengthy summary did in
fact please Sue in that particular instance. So making the moderators
bar posts like the one
On Tue, Jun 1, 2010 at 2:57 PM, Risker risker...@gmail.com wrote:
Procedural note to moderators: Perhaps it is time to consider a length
limit on posting?
I'm not a moderator, but I've just been skipping those long posts.
They are annoying, but I may one day read those posts if I have
nothing
On 1 June 2010 16:17, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote:
I'm not a moderator, but I've just been skipping those long posts.
They are annoying, but I may one day read those posts if I have
nothing better to do, and sometimes there is something interesting in
there.
Now you know how
At 09:38 AM 6/1/2010, AGK wrote:
Derailing meta-discussion with criticism of specific users stinks of
axe-grinding.
I criticized an argument with an expression of concern about how an
administrator might apply that argument. That remains within
metadiscussion. I specicifically disclaimed any
At 09:57 AM 6/1/2010, Risker wrote:
Procedural note to moderators: Perhaps it is time to consider a length
limit on posting?
There is a 20K limit. That's lower than usual, my experience. I think
it's silly, since it is easier to ignore one 30K post than to ignore
two 15 K posts. But, hey, I
At 10:01 AM 6/1/2010, you wrote:
On 1 June 2010 14:30, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
Therefore, instead of only needing to skip one mail, you'll need to
skip two. This is part one.
Abd, have you ever considered opening a blog? :)
You could write the lengthy version of your
At 11:17 AM 6/1/2010, Carcharoth wrote:
On Tue, Jun 1, 2010 at 2:57 PM, Risker risker...@gmail.com wrote:
Procedural note to moderators: Perhaps it is time to consider a length
limit on posting?
I'm not a moderator, but I've just been skipping those long posts.
They are annoying, but I may
On Tue, Jun 1, 2010 at 7:02 PM, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com
wrote:
At 11:17 AM 6/1/2010, Carcharoth wrote:
On Tue, Jun 1, 2010 at 2:57 PM, Risker risker...@gmail.com wrote:
Procedural note to moderators: Perhaps it is time to consider a length
limit on posting?
I'm not a
On Tue, Jun 1, 2010 at 5:47 PM, AGK wiki...@gmail.com wrote:
On 1 June 2010 16:17, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote:
I'm not a moderator, but I've just been skipping those long posts.
They are annoying, but I may one day read those posts if I have
nothing better to do, and
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
The Wikipedia community
painted itself into a corner, and it's entirely unclear to me if it
can find the exits, the paths to fix it.
As this discussion illustrates rather well, the argument if you want to
fix A, you'd have to start by fixing B (my pet gripe) first
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
The Wikipedia community
painted itself into a corner, and it's entirely unclear to me if it
can find the exits, the paths to fix it.
on 5/31/10 2:43 AM, Charles Matthews at charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com
wrote:
As this discussion illustrates rather well, the
On 31 May 2010, at 00:39, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com
wrote:
(1) most legitimate admin work is not controversial to any degree
that would affect an admin's status in the active community, which is
what counts. Blocking an IP vandal isn't going to harm that, and it
will only
On 31 May 2010 13:42, Marc Riddell michaeldavi...@comcast.net wrote:
Yes. And thank you, Charles. Once again this points out the fact that, with
the Foundation, we are dealing with a group of persons who don't have a clue
how to deal with people who they see as being out of their
David Gerard wrote:
On 31 May 2010 13:42, Marc Riddell michaeldavi...@comcast.net wrote:
Yes. And thank you, Charles. Once again this points out the fact that, with
the Foundation, we are dealing with a group of persons who don't have a clue
how to deal with people who they see as being
On Sun, 30 May 2010 21:49:49 -0400, Abd wrote:
And I feel that I did. I've watched the community, in a few cases,
adopt as consensus what I'd proposed to jeers and boos, there is
some satisfaction in that
Maybe the initial reaction you get to your proposals, even ones that
eventually
At 02:43 AM 5/31/2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
The Wikipedia community
painted itself into a corner, and it's entirely unclear to me if it
can find the exits, the paths to fix it.
As this discussion illustrates rather well, the argument if you want to
fix A, you'd
At 10:34 AM 5/31/2010, AGK wrote:
On 31 May 2010, at 00:39, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com
wrote:
(1) most legitimate admin work is not controversial to any degree
that would affect an admin's status in the active community, which is
what counts. Blocking an IP vandal isn't going
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
At 02:43 AM 5/31/2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
The Wikipedia community
painted itself into a corner, and it's entirely unclear to me if it
can find the exits, the paths to fix it.
As this discussion illustrates rather well, the
On 31 May 2010 18:49, AGK wiki...@gmail.com wrote:
On 31 May 2010, at 18:21, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com
wrote:
But AGK is
an administrator, and if he expects that police work will almost
always cause the administrator to gain enemies, I rather suspect
that some of his work is
At 01:49 PM 5/31/2010, AGK wrote:
On 31 May 2010, at 18:21, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com
wrote:
But AGK is
an administrator, and if he expects that police work will almost
always cause the administrator to gain enemies, I rather suspect
that some of his work is less than
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
At 01:35 PM 5/31/2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
Actually, most people who don't apply as an admin just don't apply.
With ten million registered editors and a handful of RfAs, that's
obvious.
They
don't generate evidence one way or another. It is a perfectly
On 31 May 2010 19:46, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
These are issues that I've been thinking about for almost thirty
years, and with Wikipedia, intensively, for almost three years
specifically (and as to on-line process, for over twenty years). So
my comments get long. If
Administrators differ in competence, and perhaps even in
trustworthiness, but I think experience has shown that not even the
most experienced and trusted of all will always correctly interpret
the view of the community, and that nobody whomsoever can really trust
himself or be trusted by others
At 03:28 PM 5/31/2010, David Gerard wrote:
On 31 May 2010 19:46, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
These are issues that I've been thinking about for almost thirty
years, and with Wikipedia, intensively, for almost three years
specifically (and as to on-line process, for over
At 11:19 AM 5/31/2010, Charles Matthews wrote:
[...] remedies - for a bigger picture
- have the disadvantages of requiring a great deal of investment of
time. I believe I have tried a number of those, without yet getting a
complete view of the elephant.
Right. Sensible. There is a solution to
At 02:17 PM 5/31/2010, David Gerard wrote:
Abd has been beaten around the head by the arbcom on several
occasions, and so has an understandably negative view of power
structures on Wikipedia in general - since it couldn't possibly be the
case that he was ever actually wrong or anything.
My views
I'm not quite sure if this responding to what I wrote or to other bits
above, but it seems in part to apply to what I said, so I will respond
accordingly. First of all, my proposal was not meant, in any sense, to
suggest supplanting consensus with the arbitrary judgement of bureaucrats.
To the
At 03:28 PM 5/31/2010, David Gerard wrote:
On 31 May 2010 19:46, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
These are issues that I've been thinking about for almost thirty
years, and with Wikipedia, intensively, for almost three years
specifically (and as to on-line process, for over
At 12:11 PM 5/31/2010, Daniel R. Tobias wrote:
On Sun, 30 May 2010 21:49:49 -0400, Abd wrote:
And I feel that I did. I've watched the community, in a few cases,
adopt as consensus what I'd proposed to jeers and boos, there is
some satisfaction in that
Maybe the initial reaction you get
On 31 May 2010 23:17, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
You are not that important, and your influence is rapidly fading.
No indeed I'm not, and I am most pleased that it is, because I get
annoyed a lot less. However, I hope I can tell the obvious, e.g. that
bringing interesting
At 05:51 PM 5/31/2010, David Lindsey wrote:
The key is not making it easier to remove adminship. This proposal gets us
closer to the real problem, but fails to fully perceive it as does the
common call to separate the functions of adminship.
Generally, Mr. Lindsey has written a cogent
At 06:11 PM 5/31/2010, David Goodman wrote:
The assumption in closing is that after discarding non-arguments, the
consensus view will be the correct one, and that any neutral admin
would agree. Thus there is in theory no difference between closing per
the majority and closing per the strongest
At 07:34 PM 5/31/2010, you wrote:
On 31 May 2010 23:17, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
You are not that important, and your influence is rapidly fading.
No indeed I'm not, and I am most pleased that it is, because I get
annoyed a lot less. However, I hope I can tell the
Neither they nor anyone else knows how to do this at our scale in as
open a structure as ours. Most ideas tend to retreat towards one form
or another of centralized control over content or to division of the
project to reduce the scale. That it is possible to organize well
enough to do what
Let's not mince words: Wikipedia administratorship can be a serious
liability. The 'reward' for volunteering for this educational nonprofit can
include getting one's real name Googlebombed, getting late night phone calls
to one's home, and worse. The Wikimedia Foundation has never sent a cease
Michael Peel wrote:
We block our precious new users at the drop of a hat, but an admin has to do
something pretty damned horrific to even consider removing their status, and
even then it takes months.
This depends on what you define as 'pretty damned horrific. I'd say that
it's
Re the theory that making it easier to get rid of admins could be a
solution to the decline in their active numbers. This is one of those
perennial theories that often sidetracks any attempt at WT:RFA to
reform the process; But has at least once failed to get consensus for
change - not least
On 30 May 2010 11:36, WereSpielChequers
werespielchequ...@googlemail.com wrote:
As for the idea that we should move to Hi, I noticed that you
speedy-deleted some files that do not appear to meet the CSD criteria;
your SysOp staus has been removed _while we discuss it_. I've done
over 4,000
The reasonable people here who discuss this are not the admins about
whom there is a problem. There are many admins who make errors and
refuse to discuss them, and a few who deliberately and intentionally
ignore the restrictions of deletion policy. I have so far not even
attempted the various
On 30 May 2010 11:43, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote:
Indeed. The first - and, I would have thought, jawdroppingly obvious -
result would be that no-one at all would go near such work in any
circumstances.
Exactly. The big problem with community desysoppings is that any admin
doing their
At 01:58 PM 5/30/2010, Thomas Dalton wrote:
On 30 May 2010 11:43, David Gerard dger...@gmail.com wrote:
Indeed. The first - and, I would have thought, jawdroppingly obvious -
result would be that no-one at all would go near such work in any
circumstances.
Exactly. The big problem with
On 31/05/2010, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
As to regular deletion, an admin is assessing
arguments and consensus at an AfD, and, if doing this well, doesn't
delete unless there is consensus for it, or, alternatively, the
arguments are clear and evidenced.
Actually it's not
At 06:43 AM 5/30/2010, David Gerard wrote:
On 30 May 2010 11:36, WereSpielChequers
werespielchequ...@googlemail.com wrote: As
for the idea that we should move to Hi, I
noticed that you speedy-deleted some files
that do not appear to meet the CSD criteria;
your SysOp staus has been removed
At 08:14 PM 5/30/2010, Ian Woollard wrote:
On 31/05/2010, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax a...@lomaxdesign.com wrote:
As to regular deletion, an admin is assessing
arguments and consensus at an AfD, and, if doing this well, doesn't
delete unless there is consensus for it, or, alternatively, the
that is our current RfA.
Sadly, AGF is missing from RfA.
Date: Thu, 27 May 2010 15:38:09 -0700
From: Matt Jacobs
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] declining numbers of EN wiki admins
To: wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Message-ID:
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Date: Wed, 26 May
On 28 May 2010, at 18:13, c h c...@live.co.uk wrote:
Imagine if it worked more like blocking - if an admin fucks up,
remove their SysOp and have a chat about it. Hi, I noticed that you
speedy-deleted some files that do not appear to meet the CSD
criteria; your SysOp staus has been
On 27 May 2010 23:38, Matt Jacobs sxeptoman...@gmail.com wrote:
My guess is that it's because the bureaucracy has become too intimidating.
I suspect many editors do not want to commit the time and effort to learning
it all.
All guesswork is a fruitless exercise, in the absence of any data on
On Wed, May 26, 2010 at 7:34 PM, David Goodman dgoodma...@gmail.com wrote:
Are you saying that a _declining_ number of administrators means a
_growth_ in bureaucracy? It would normally mean the opposite, either
a loss of control, or that the ordinary members were taking the
function upon
On Thu, May 27, 2010 at 1:04 AM, Gwern Branwen gwe...@gmail.com wrote:
snip
Some of these statistics are old. But I don't know of any newer more
optimistic data.
I remain convinced (gut feeling not based on statistics) that
Wikipedia growth and development goes in phases, and that after an
Date: Wed, 26 May 2010 20:04:43 -0400
From: Gwern Branwen gwe...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] declining numbers of EN wiki admins
To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Message-ID:
aanlktilwklp_wogqqaw9dzzdqgukswbcut-rtzvbv...@mail.gmail.com
Content-Type: text/plain
Pretty much. That's more or less why I quit the project.
On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 1:51 PM, The Cunctator cuncta...@gmail.com wrote:
By all measures, en.wiki has been in decline for years as an active
project.
It's just the typical death by bureaucracy that most projects like this
undergo.
Are you saying that a _declining_ number of administrators means a
_growth_ in bureaucracy? It would normally mean the opposite, either
a loss of control, or that the ordinary members were taking the
function upon themselves. What I see is a greater degree of control
and uniformity, not driven
We need to remember that correlation does not imply causation here,
which I think is what David is slightly hinting at. There are probably
many other factors in admin decline as well, including increased
popularity of Wikipedia (which leads and has led to a lot more problems,
good and bad),
Yes, stagnation is far more accurate. Thing is, it used to be a
source of pride to tell your real world associates that you're a
wikipedia admin. You'd even put it on your resume. Now, it's a bit of
an embarassing secret and you definitely would not raise it in a job
interview.
On 3/25/10, Thomas
On 13 May 2010 07:07, David Katz dkatz2...@gmail.com wrote:
Yes, stagnation is far more accurate. Thing is, it used to be a
source of pride to tell your real world associates that you're a
wikipedia admin. You'd even put it on your resume. Now, it's a bit of
an embarassing secret and you
On 05/13/2010 12:29 AM, David Gerard wrote:
On 13 May 2010 07:07, David Katzdkatz2...@gmail.com wrote:
Yes, stagnation is far more accurate. Thing is, it used to be a
source of pride to tell your real world associates that you're a
wikipedia admin. You'd even put it on your resume. Now,
On 25 March 2010 23:10, Thomas Dalton thomas.dal...@gmail.com wrote:
On 25 March 2010 21:55, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 5:48 PM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote:
On 25 March 2010 21:03, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
A couple more questions to which I don't know the
o_0 Citation needed. I've been amazed how it's become increasingly a
talking point on my CV over the years. (I put it in other interests
at the end.) People *like* Wikipedia.
That they do. People might write it off in conversation, but secretly,
when they google that obscure term they heard
Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2010 20:50:53 +
From: David Gerard dger...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] declining numbers of EN wiki admins
To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org
On 25 March 2010 20:45, Kwan Ting Chan k...@ktchan.info wrote:
Well, they're not dwindling since
On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 10:54 PM, Phantomsteve
wikipe...@phantom-enterprises.co.uk wrote:
snip
Has anyone compared the activity rate of admins over time to that of
non-admins? For example, what %age of admins whose accounts were created in
2006 are active, compared to the %age of non-admins
David Gerard wrote:
On 25 March 2010 20:45, Kwan Ting Chan k...@ktchan.info wrote:
Well, they're not dwindling since admin rights don't get taken away on
inactivity. ;-) But to the general question, because the standard expected
of a candidate for RfA has gone up over the years?
On 26 March 2010 08:57, Charles Matthews
charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com wrote:
Given that WikiProjects generally will have a better idea of the
character and contributions of participants (compared to those whose
idea of RfA is an extended box-ticking process), I'd like to see
projects look
David Gerard wrote:
On 26 March 2010 08:57, Charles Matthews
charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com wrote:
Given that WikiProjects generally will have a better idea of the
character and contributions of participants (compared to those whose
idea of RfA is an extended box-ticking process), I'd
The number of admins on the English Wikipedia may possibly have
peaked, and the number of active admins is 20% down on its peak of a
couple of years ago.
Dec 2009, Jan 2010 and February 2010 had only 19 successful RFAs
between them, with December and January both equalling the previous
all time
On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 1:24 PM, WereSpielChequers
werespielchequ...@googlemail.com wrote:
The number of admins on the English Wikipedia may possibly have
peaked, and the number of active admins is 20% down on its peak of a
couple of years ago.
Dec 2009, Jan 2010 and February 2010 had only 19
WereSpielChequers wrote:
What are the likely results of a dwindling number of admins, and a
growing wikigeneration gap between admins and other editors?
Well, they're not dwindling since admin rights don't get taken away on
inactivity. ;-) But to the general question, because the standard
On 25 March 2010 20:45, Kwan Ting Chan k...@ktchan.info wrote:
Well, they're not dwindling since admin rights don't get taken away on
inactivity. ;-) But to the general question, because the standard expected
of a candidate for RfA has gone up over the years?
And because going through a
By all measures, en.wiki has been in decline for years as an active project.
It's just the typical death by bureaucracy that most projects like this
undergo.
On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 4:45 PM, Kwan Ting Chan k...@ktchan.info wrote:
WereSpielChequers wrote:
What are the likely results of a
On 25 March 2010 20:51, The Cunctator cuncta...@gmail.com wrote:
By all measures, en.wiki has been in decline for years as an active project.
It's just the typical death by bureaucracy that most projects like this
undergo.
I think death is overstating it. Many things show rapid growth
followed
A couple more questions to which I don't know the answer:
1) What is the total administrative workload now compared to previous periods?
2) Is there a mean period of activity for editors, and do we reduce
the number of new administrators (or the period during which new
administrators are active)
On 25 March 2010 21:03, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
A couple more questions to which I don't know the answer:
1) What is the total administrative workload now compared to previous periods?
The peak was probably back when we sorted out the fair use issues. I'd
say that beyond that it's
On 25 March 2010 21:55, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
Typical to what period of time? Presumably the anti-vandal bots,
huggle and the abuse filter cut down on the need for administrators
working in that area, as an example.
Abuse filter perhaps but the others if anything increase the demand
On 25 March 2010 21:55, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
On Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 5:48 PM, geni geni...@gmail.com wrote:
On 25 March 2010 21:03, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
A couple more questions to which I don't know the answer:
1) What is the total administrative workload now compared to
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