User:Haza-w/ABF

“ I've neither supported nor opposed this candidate, but I must say, I've never seen such blatant assumptions of bad faith, as are currently being made in the oppose section. Opposing because the candidate showed support for a retired editor? Opposing because the candidate edited the same article as you? Because 35% [of] the candidate's edits are in mainspace (what the hell is that)? ” — auburnpilot

“ Thank you for the fairness of your comment AuburnPilot. ... and we still wonder why so very many editors won't go anywhere near RfA? ” — VS

I first decided to start contributing seriously to Wikipedia during January 2006, at much the same time as the release of Walt Disney's travesty, High School Musical, which left populations the world over with deep mental scarring.

Perhaps in an attempt to show the world that Wikipedia would be a force of reason in these troubled times, adminship hopefuls passing through RfA were generally supported by the community, provided they fit the following criteria:

• upwards of three to four thousand edits, depending on the nature and distribution of their contributions;
• a strong history of vandalism reverting and involvement with the various aspects of the deletion process, such as SD, AfD and (as of February 4 that year) ProD, since those areas were of particular importance in administrators;
• no history of incivility or bad faith editing, disputes with other editors, or 3RR violations, or other severe dickery, unless in the distant past and redeemed by a long period of good contributions;
• a strong understanding of, and compliance with, the five pillars;
• an ability to act coolly and calmly in heated exchanges;

...and that was pretty much it. Participants in RfAs generally assumed good faith on the part of the candidate. Unless there was a good reason why that candidate should not be trusted with the tools, they were generally granted adminship by the community. In any case, if they screwed up, then they could easily be blocked, the damage reverted, and the mop revoked via ArbCom ruling.

I took a necessitated leave of absence from the end of 2006, as real life was rapidly catching up with me. When I returned in 2008, RfA was definitely not as I remembered it. I fully recognise the place of opposition to RfAs as a vital aspect of the process, preventing untrustworthy or inexperienced users from misusing the tools or making impressive blunders. However, editors who would have been wholeheartedly supported two years ago are now often shunned by their peers at RfA, and often for little or no reason. Some of the oppose comments I've seen made me double-take, with reasons such as:

• editcountitis. It's still around, and it's a whole lot worse than it was. I've seen candidates amassing tens of thousands of edits in a matter of a couple of months, which suggests to me that either a lot of those edits are (semi-)automated, or that user needs to get out more. However, those candidates are far more likely to succeed than those who have been around longer with a steadier edit history – voting patterns vary, but I've witnessed "not enough edits" oppose votes for candidates with more than 5000 edits in around half a year, which for me is more than enough to suggest a stable editing history.
• not having enough article contributions. Writing and maintaining articles is now considered a main criterion by many, if not the majority of, RfA participants. However, Special:ListGroupRights does not list the edit permission as sysop-only. Article contribution is arguably the most important aspect of Wikipedia – the project would be pretty rubbish without a mainspace – but it proves nothing about your ability to handle administrative tools. You don't need to have written the article Wanker to revert the anonymous editor who blanks the page with "JIMMY PRICE IS A RIGHT BELLEND!!!!111!!" (Must have 10,000 edits, three featured articles...)
• "there are already too many admins". CAT:AB begs to differ. Until WP:RfA is shut down and made a historical archive of a process that once was, that is a pretty crap excuse for an oppose vote.
• "I view self-noms as prima facie evidence of power hunger". Self-nomination is permitted for a reason. If self-nomination were proven to indicate power hunger, then it would not be permitted as a route to RfA.

In other words, many participants in RfAs were no longer looking for reasons to support the candidate, but reasons to oppose them – they were assuming bad faith on the part of the candidates whom they were commenting upon. Granting adminship used to be no big deal; it now seems to be anything but.

The reasons for this could be numerous (lack of a watertight recall process, the increased volume of RfA applications due to Wikipedia's swelling userbase, etc.) but I believe that until this issue is addressed, the RfA process will become more and more hostile towards candidates, which benefits nobody.

None of the perennial RfA reform proposals have so far attained consensus, so it's time that we either came up with a better one, or simply asked people to respectfully unscrew themselves.

See also

• Wikipedia:RFA reform
• User:Ral315/WTHN
• User:Avraham/RfA-B
• User:Balloonman/the coach