This is the page for discussing the voting procedure and other aspects of the arbcom election.
Unofficial results may seen at User:Gurch/Reports/ArbComElections.
A graph of voting over time is at Image:ArbComm2006History.png (unofficial).
I don't think this will scale too well and there is still the problem that votes are visible. Geni 01:32, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
Personally, I didn't vote at all in the last election because I think that open elections can cause problems. A lot of candidates dropped out mid-race. And there seemed to be some bickering IIRC. Boardvote seems to me to be a much better solution. — Ilyan e p (Talk) 21:25, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
Bad bad bad idea. [ælfəks] 05:55, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Much better. Votes are hidden for one thing. [ælfəks] 05:55, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
I also support this, though I'd like a discussion page of some sort where we can...discuss...and possibly ask candidates questions like on RfA ST47 Talk 15:24, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
Can we please hurry up and decide whether to use Special:Boardvote or not? If Jimbo has objections, can he please post them here? If we need election officials, can we recruit some here? My current thought is that if we use the RFA system I shall boycott the elections and petition others to do likewise. [ælfəks] 05:29, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
I have no objection in principle to a secret ballot, but the standard wiki voting system is much more in line with our traditions and appears to produce better results. When we used Special:BoardVote, we saw a significant amount of trolling and negative campaigning. With the wiki system, we get much better behavior. Additionally, even though Special:BoardVote is theoretically "approval voting", the fact of the matter is that people have tended to use it incorrectly (in my opinion) leading to very low rates of approval. Wiki voting tends to produce high levels of support, and this is important for the confidence and credibility of the committee. We can use the same system as last year again this year, so that we can get things moving quickly, and then after that, we can talk about possible alternatives going forward.-- Jimbo Wales 18:56, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
For more on why open ballots are such a bad idea, one needs look no further than our own articles on Secret ballot and Political privacy:
"The secret ballot guarantees that it is one's private opinion that counts. Open ballots are not truly free for those whose preferences defy the structures of power or friendship." -- Mark B. Cohen (From Secret Ballot
- Stephanie Daugherty (Triona) - Talk - Comment - 08:34, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Voting should be raised to 150. Makes em' learn how to use the system.-- The Fourth Swordsman 22:22, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
1000 edits minium. Doesn't effect those with any real chance and limits the election to those who can form a reasonable assment of their chances. Geni 01:32, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
How about this? Personally, I find the concept of self-nomination both highly distasteful, and leads to, as Geni says, an excess of problems with people putting their names forward without a "snowball's chance in hell", as it were. Just an idea. James F. (talk) 15:00, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
As someone recently noted on the administrators' noticeboard, we seem to be a bit behind schedule here. The page indicates that candidate statements may be posted as of October 1 and the election will be held in December, but there are no statements posted and it appears the election rules have not yet been finalized. What is the current status and plan? Also, is there any indication whether the current ArbCom members whose terms are about to expire intend to run for re-election? Thanks, Newyorkbrad 20:49, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
I'm somewhat bemused about this myself. Apparently statements have been accepted since about a month ago, but as long as the page says "Note this is not a final version" it doesn't seem rational to submit a statement - and currently there aren't any. Presumably there'll be a "ready, set, go" moment when the page is finalised, and it becomes widely advertised that statements are being accepted - any idea when? Tomorrow will be a month until the deadline for self-nominations. -- Sam Blanning (talk) 03:59, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Can someone provide links to pages describing the positions, what they involve, and how long the terms are? Apologies if this is all already written in planning documents, but just not made public yet. Also, can someone clarify how current ArbCom cases are handled in the period of transfer when current members stand down and newly elected members take up their posts? Thanks. Carcharoth 10:27, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
Do we want to increase the number of seats on the committee? The committee isn't always at full strength and maybe we need to expand a little more. I can't see any harm in adding another three seats, increasing the number up for election to 8. That would increase the committee to 17 and make it an odd number, a good idea in my mind for decision making committees. Hiding Talk 15:01, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
Bainer is probably right that if the number of Arbitors be extended to 18 or 21 it would make sense to split duties so that each member is assigned to only certain cases. I'd say 21, random assignment by senior member, each hear 50% or cases; but such a system may not be in the cards. Though it might be worth discussion as the caseload is likely to be increasing for the forseeable future. Seperately though, I see that there has been a vacancy on the arbcom since February only a month after the last election. If Jimbo didn't appoint anyone to that slot (as my reading of the election procedures suggests he could have), he presumably won't appoint anyone to fill vacancies in the coming year. Thus only five slots are likely to be filled based on these results unless someone without an expiring term resigns before the end of the year. Eluchil404 12:14, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
One thing I'm confused about. With the ongoing reorganisation of the Wikimedia Foundation Board, and Jimbo stepping down as Chair (see here), how does that impact Jimbo's relationship with the en wikipedia and its ArbCom? From the above, it sounds like business as usual, but I'm not sure. Carcharoth 06:06, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
From my reading of that thread, the situation seems to be "normal level of clarity, to wit mud-like". Is there a centralised discussion of this anywhere, either on the (en) mailing list, or on-wiki, or just brushfire outbreaks of confusion and doubt? Call me a dangerous radical, but I'm of the view that a) the election should be just that, an election, not "voting followed by semi-correlated appointments"; and b) the terms of same should be made explicit in advance, rather than declaring the numbers of vacancies/appointments after the fact, which is an extension of the above "not an election" practices. In the worst case, if JW is declared to have "reserve powers" by the WMF (or by the community, or as seems likely, by himself, recursively), at least have the provisions for "vetos" or "captain's picks" made expressly and explicitly in advance, not after the fact tinkering. Alai 06:52, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
There was a bit of an edit war#3RR block between User:FuManChoo and User:Avraham over a question that Fu asked Avraham. Basically, Avraham felt the Fu was poisoning the well, and he might have been. However, I'd like to suggest that during a process like this, a candidate should not be removing questions related to his candidate statement. It seems to me that, while it is appropriate to respond with "You are poisoning the well, and I won't dignify that with an answer", actual removal of the question (without even providing a link to a diff to make it accessible for those who might want to reach their own judgment) probably sets a poor precedent. - Jmabel | Talk 17:14, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
[deleted post from permanently banned editor]
[deleted post from permanently banned editor]
I'd like to recommend consideration of an entirely no-nomination and non-partisan, electioneering-free system. Such systems have advantages such as offering more choice to voters as well as avoiding self-aggrandizement, partisanship, etc. Of course, any individuals so chosen could decline, but I believe a no-nomination system presents a better solution and is more in line with the consensus-building (rather than individualistic) aims and methods of Wikipedia. I think contributors are intelligent enough to make informed choices by witnessing the behavior of fellow Wikipedians without needing to read speeches. Brettz9 08:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Not to venture too far off topic, but I am reminded of the Tetragrammaton in Equilibrium. Is Christian Bale up for election? If not, where did these names come from? GChriss < always listening>< c> 09:05, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Will there be any guidance as to how many candidates an editor may support? should support? It doesn't seem like there is likely going to be an enforceable maximum or minimum, but is there a number we should aim for? or a number that makes good sense? or, if that's too tough, a number that really doesn't make sense? or are we on our own, guided by our best judgment? Jd2718 21:19, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
There are actually some fascinating "strategic voting" issues presented based on the format of the elections, about which each voter will have to decide. Newyorkbrad 12:50, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, apart from the question of whether Jayjg will run for re-election, I was wondering if there is likely to be a rush of last-minute candidates? What happened in the last elections in January? There are currently 31 candidates for this election, and there were 68 in the last election. Also, what happens in the period between the closing of nominations (1 December) and the opening of voting (4 December)? Carcharoth 12:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
What probably happens on December 2 and 3 (next weekend) is that the election officials/volunteers set up the voting page for each candidate. I would guess most candidates would have declared by now; the banner at the top of every page has been there for almost a month now. Newyorkbrad 12:55, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
36 candidates, as of 13:40 UTC. Still over 12 hours to go before nominations close. Three new candidates nominated themselves recently (2 today), but an earlier candidate withdrew. Carcharoth 13:44, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
Some collaborative work has been taking place to produce the summary table seen here. There may be better tables around elsewhere, and the Signpost might also produce some useful summaries of information. I suppose the questions are:
If the summary table is acceptable, I'd be happy to maintain and update it until the elections start, though I'd hope that it would also be maintained by the community, in the same way that it was built. Carcharoth 02:38, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Pendantic and maybe slightly unnecessary, but I'm interested in a list of those candidates that nominated themselves and then withdrew. I guess I can get such a list by going through the history of the candidates statement page, but does anyone already have such a list? Carcharoth 18:42, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Just noting here that The Wikipedia Signpost has produced a comparison of candidates, including a few questions asked of all candidates, which can be found here. Ral315 ( talk) 05:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
Actions count more than nice statements, so I would like to see examples of how candidates handled tricky arbitration issues. To this end, I just added a column "Examples" to the Summary table - please help me populate it! I also encourage candidates themselves; and I think it's also fine to insert counterexamples. Thanks, — Sebastian (talk) 21:09, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
"Self-nominations were accepted up to 1 December 2006" - does this mean candidates can still be nominated by third parties, or is it completely closed now? If nothing else, this is relevant to a recent tense change on the main page. -- Sam Blanning (talk) 12:56, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
I must say I'm surprised there wasn't a rush of early votes like last time, and that mine was the first vote - but I digress. In the elections in January there was a bot that calculated the running totals every hour. Is there going to be the same thing this time? Fys. Ta fys aym. 00:09, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
User:Oleg Alexandrov ran something with Mathbot, and user:Interiot also had something in January. We could ask them to track this election. NoSeptember 00:13, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
See User:Gurch/Reports/ArbComElections. — Centrx→ talk • 07:54, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
See also User:Mathbot/ArbCom Election December 2006. NoSeptember 13:29, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Can I just ask whether something can be put down somewhere about how status of the voters is being checked? Are there people dealing with this (more organised), or is it meant to be a collaborative community effort where everyone checks the votes (duplicates efforts). Carcharoth 11:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Is it not possible to move discussions that develop on the voting pages to the discussion pages of the vote pages, leaving a link behind showing that a discussion had started there? That would make the voting pages easier to read, and less, well, messy and argumentative. Carcharoth 11:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
He vanished from the list. I went to vote oppose on him and now he's gone. Question page is there, but no vote page. He's not in the withdrawn candidates. Anomo 14:32, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
I decided after much thought and the first few weeks of my new job, that it would be a disservice to wikipedie for me to run for ArbCom this year; fearing that my job would require too much of my attention. Perhaps next year, if I have settled into a routine, I will be able to devote the proper time to Arbcom. -- Avi 16:32, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Can't see this recorded on this talk page or other election pages, so I thought I'd drop a note here in case the example can help in planning for future elections. The issue seems now to be resolved by example from sitting arbitrators. Anyway, the issue of whether and how (comments or no comments) candidates should vote against each other in the elections was raised by Cyde Weys, with sensible concerns about divisive commentary, and contested by Mailer Diablo and Jd2718. See here and here for examples of discussions (now, thankfully, halted). More discussions and history are scattered over the 37 candidate question pages. Anyway, as I said above, the issue seems to have been resolved as (at least 2) sitting arbitrators are leading by example and voting in the elections. Carcharoth 16:27, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
In connection with WikiCast, would someone be interested in getting 'audio' statments from the candidates?
I know some candidtaes are standing in respect of certain issues, statments on WikiCast would give them a chance to perhaps expand on why they are standing...
ShakespeareFan00 20:13, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
May I transclude or link User:DumbBOT/E here? It's a bot-generated summary of the current status of votes. Tizio 12:24, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
Three candidates have now withdrawn after less than two days. At first I was annoyed that I wouldn't get the chance to vote for or against them, but now I realise I can spend more time considering how to vote on the other candidates! :-) Carcharoth 22:15, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
One more candidate gone, now. Freakofnurture. Rather bizarre as well. Some reference to "IRC discussions" and oppose votes numbers 68 and 68 linking to what I can only describe as "swearing by proxy using one's contributions list" (from August 2006) - rather inventive, actually! So those who haven't voted yet now only have 33 candidates to choose from. Carcharoth 17:49, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Please change all writing to past tense where necessary (e.g Voting ran for two weeks.) Thanks, -- WikiSlasher 03:05, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
The page is not a historical record as long as the elections are not over, i.e., new arbitrators are not appointed. As may be seen from the page, new appointments were expected to be announced on Monday. Today is Wednesday. Does anybody know what is the reason for procrastination and where the announcement will eventually be made? -- Ghirla -трёп- 09:12, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
Hopefully the appointments will be from the top of the election winners and non-controversial. My bigger concern is that, as luck would have it, ArbCom has accepted four new cases within the past two days, and looks likely to accept at least two more currently pending applications. If the transition isn't managed well, that means the newly constituted ArbCom is going to start off the year with a huge backlog, which would be highly undesirable in terms of getting cases resolved promptly which has been the biggest problem all year with our arbitration policy. I've left a note for Jimbo urging that he make his appointments as soon as he reasonably and conveniently can so the new arbs can start getting up to speed. Newyorkbrad 21:38, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the graph, trialsanderrors; it certainly mirrors the way I was eyeballing the results. I would say that all of the top seven have clear community consensus to serve on ArbCom, but with six empty seats 7 is a tricky number to appoint since it leaves one Tranche bigger than the others. Jimbo, of course, has a variety of options, but I would say just appoint six and fill any vacancies that arise with whoever gets left out this time. Eluchil404 04:43, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
I wonder when Jimbo will appoint the new ArbCom members, since Mindspillage recently resigned then there should be seven appointed. I think the graph is kind of a good idea and let's see what Jimbo has to say. We shall wait for the results, excited to see who are part of the ArbCom. Ter e nc e Ong 07:45, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
The deed is done! [6] I think that it is an excellent and equitable solution, but the page needs to be updated. I'd do it but my prior unprotection request was declined :-) . Eluchil404 05:13, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Overall the elections went smoothly. However, one thing I believe we should be stricter in next year is moving voter's comments to the talk page. It's probably best to move all such comments, but especially comments that are rather lengthy or contain diffs should be moved. The reason is that opposers tend to use these to cast the candidate in bad light by give a one-sided view of a situation he was involved in, in a manner that the candidate cannot really respond to on the voting page. Voters that feel the need to write a long story about the candidate tend to be people with an axe to grind, anyway. It would be easy to construct a bot to do the moving. >Radiant< 13:16, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
How to run next year's should probably be disscussed at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2007. Geni 16:26, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
This is the page for discussing the voting procedure and other aspects of the arbcom election.
Unofficial results may seen at User:Gurch/Reports/ArbComElections.
A graph of voting over time is at Image:ArbComm2006History.png (unofficial).
I don't think this will scale too well and there is still the problem that votes are visible. Geni 01:32, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
Personally, I didn't vote at all in the last election because I think that open elections can cause problems. A lot of candidates dropped out mid-race. And there seemed to be some bickering IIRC. Boardvote seems to me to be a much better solution. — Ilyan e p (Talk) 21:25, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
Bad bad bad idea. [ælfəks] 05:55, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
Much better. Votes are hidden for one thing. [ælfəks] 05:55, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
I also support this, though I'd like a discussion page of some sort where we can...discuss...and possibly ask candidates questions like on RfA ST47 Talk 15:24, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
Can we please hurry up and decide whether to use Special:Boardvote or not? If Jimbo has objections, can he please post them here? If we need election officials, can we recruit some here? My current thought is that if we use the RFA system I shall boycott the elections and petition others to do likewise. [ælfəks] 05:29, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
I have no objection in principle to a secret ballot, but the standard wiki voting system is much more in line with our traditions and appears to produce better results. When we used Special:BoardVote, we saw a significant amount of trolling and negative campaigning. With the wiki system, we get much better behavior. Additionally, even though Special:BoardVote is theoretically "approval voting", the fact of the matter is that people have tended to use it incorrectly (in my opinion) leading to very low rates of approval. Wiki voting tends to produce high levels of support, and this is important for the confidence and credibility of the committee. We can use the same system as last year again this year, so that we can get things moving quickly, and then after that, we can talk about possible alternatives going forward.-- Jimbo Wales 18:56, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
For more on why open ballots are such a bad idea, one needs look no further than our own articles on Secret ballot and Political privacy:
"The secret ballot guarantees that it is one's private opinion that counts. Open ballots are not truly free for those whose preferences defy the structures of power or friendship." -- Mark B. Cohen (From Secret Ballot
- Stephanie Daugherty (Triona) - Talk - Comment - 08:34, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Voting should be raised to 150. Makes em' learn how to use the system.-- The Fourth Swordsman 22:22, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
1000 edits minium. Doesn't effect those with any real chance and limits the election to those who can form a reasonable assment of their chances. Geni 01:32, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
How about this? Personally, I find the concept of self-nomination both highly distasteful, and leads to, as Geni says, an excess of problems with people putting their names forward without a "snowball's chance in hell", as it were. Just an idea. James F. (talk) 15:00, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
As someone recently noted on the administrators' noticeboard, we seem to be a bit behind schedule here. The page indicates that candidate statements may be posted as of October 1 and the election will be held in December, but there are no statements posted and it appears the election rules have not yet been finalized. What is the current status and plan? Also, is there any indication whether the current ArbCom members whose terms are about to expire intend to run for re-election? Thanks, Newyorkbrad 20:49, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
I'm somewhat bemused about this myself. Apparently statements have been accepted since about a month ago, but as long as the page says "Note this is not a final version" it doesn't seem rational to submit a statement - and currently there aren't any. Presumably there'll be a "ready, set, go" moment when the page is finalised, and it becomes widely advertised that statements are being accepted - any idea when? Tomorrow will be a month until the deadline for self-nominations. -- Sam Blanning (talk) 03:59, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Can someone provide links to pages describing the positions, what they involve, and how long the terms are? Apologies if this is all already written in planning documents, but just not made public yet. Also, can someone clarify how current ArbCom cases are handled in the period of transfer when current members stand down and newly elected members take up their posts? Thanks. Carcharoth 10:27, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
Do we want to increase the number of seats on the committee? The committee isn't always at full strength and maybe we need to expand a little more. I can't see any harm in adding another three seats, increasing the number up for election to 8. That would increase the committee to 17 and make it an odd number, a good idea in my mind for decision making committees. Hiding Talk 15:01, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
Bainer is probably right that if the number of Arbitors be extended to 18 or 21 it would make sense to split duties so that each member is assigned to only certain cases. I'd say 21, random assignment by senior member, each hear 50% or cases; but such a system may not be in the cards. Though it might be worth discussion as the caseload is likely to be increasing for the forseeable future. Seperately though, I see that there has been a vacancy on the arbcom since February only a month after the last election. If Jimbo didn't appoint anyone to that slot (as my reading of the election procedures suggests he could have), he presumably won't appoint anyone to fill vacancies in the coming year. Thus only five slots are likely to be filled based on these results unless someone without an expiring term resigns before the end of the year. Eluchil404 12:14, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
One thing I'm confused about. With the ongoing reorganisation of the Wikimedia Foundation Board, and Jimbo stepping down as Chair (see here), how does that impact Jimbo's relationship with the en wikipedia and its ArbCom? From the above, it sounds like business as usual, but I'm not sure. Carcharoth 06:06, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
From my reading of that thread, the situation seems to be "normal level of clarity, to wit mud-like". Is there a centralised discussion of this anywhere, either on the (en) mailing list, or on-wiki, or just brushfire outbreaks of confusion and doubt? Call me a dangerous radical, but I'm of the view that a) the election should be just that, an election, not "voting followed by semi-correlated appointments"; and b) the terms of same should be made explicit in advance, rather than declaring the numbers of vacancies/appointments after the fact, which is an extension of the above "not an election" practices. In the worst case, if JW is declared to have "reserve powers" by the WMF (or by the community, or as seems likely, by himself, recursively), at least have the provisions for "vetos" or "captain's picks" made expressly and explicitly in advance, not after the fact tinkering. Alai 06:52, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
There was a bit of an edit war#3RR block between User:FuManChoo and User:Avraham over a question that Fu asked Avraham. Basically, Avraham felt the Fu was poisoning the well, and he might have been. However, I'd like to suggest that during a process like this, a candidate should not be removing questions related to his candidate statement. It seems to me that, while it is appropriate to respond with "You are poisoning the well, and I won't dignify that with an answer", actual removal of the question (without even providing a link to a diff to make it accessible for those who might want to reach their own judgment) probably sets a poor precedent. - Jmabel | Talk 17:14, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
[deleted post from permanently banned editor]
[deleted post from permanently banned editor]
I'd like to recommend consideration of an entirely no-nomination and non-partisan, electioneering-free system. Such systems have advantages such as offering more choice to voters as well as avoiding self-aggrandizement, partisanship, etc. Of course, any individuals so chosen could decline, but I believe a no-nomination system presents a better solution and is more in line with the consensus-building (rather than individualistic) aims and methods of Wikipedia. I think contributors are intelligent enough to make informed choices by witnessing the behavior of fellow Wikipedians without needing to read speeches. Brettz9 08:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Not to venture too far off topic, but I am reminded of the Tetragrammaton in Equilibrium. Is Christian Bale up for election? If not, where did these names come from? GChriss < always listening>< c> 09:05, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Will there be any guidance as to how many candidates an editor may support? should support? It doesn't seem like there is likely going to be an enforceable maximum or minimum, but is there a number we should aim for? or a number that makes good sense? or, if that's too tough, a number that really doesn't make sense? or are we on our own, guided by our best judgment? Jd2718 21:19, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
There are actually some fascinating "strategic voting" issues presented based on the format of the elections, about which each voter will have to decide. Newyorkbrad 12:50, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, apart from the question of whether Jayjg will run for re-election, I was wondering if there is likely to be a rush of last-minute candidates? What happened in the last elections in January? There are currently 31 candidates for this election, and there were 68 in the last election. Also, what happens in the period between the closing of nominations (1 December) and the opening of voting (4 December)? Carcharoth 12:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
What probably happens on December 2 and 3 (next weekend) is that the election officials/volunteers set up the voting page for each candidate. I would guess most candidates would have declared by now; the banner at the top of every page has been there for almost a month now. Newyorkbrad 12:55, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
36 candidates, as of 13:40 UTC. Still over 12 hours to go before nominations close. Three new candidates nominated themselves recently (2 today), but an earlier candidate withdrew. Carcharoth 13:44, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
Some collaborative work has been taking place to produce the summary table seen here. There may be better tables around elsewhere, and the Signpost might also produce some useful summaries of information. I suppose the questions are:
If the summary table is acceptable, I'd be happy to maintain and update it until the elections start, though I'd hope that it would also be maintained by the community, in the same way that it was built. Carcharoth 02:38, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Pendantic and maybe slightly unnecessary, but I'm interested in a list of those candidates that nominated themselves and then withdrew. I guess I can get such a list by going through the history of the candidates statement page, but does anyone already have such a list? Carcharoth 18:42, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Just noting here that The Wikipedia Signpost has produced a comparison of candidates, including a few questions asked of all candidates, which can be found here. Ral315 ( talk) 05:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
Actions count more than nice statements, so I would like to see examples of how candidates handled tricky arbitration issues. To this end, I just added a column "Examples" to the Summary table - please help me populate it! I also encourage candidates themselves; and I think it's also fine to insert counterexamples. Thanks, — Sebastian (talk) 21:09, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
"Self-nominations were accepted up to 1 December 2006" - does this mean candidates can still be nominated by third parties, or is it completely closed now? If nothing else, this is relevant to a recent tense change on the main page. -- Sam Blanning (talk) 12:56, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
I must say I'm surprised there wasn't a rush of early votes like last time, and that mine was the first vote - but I digress. In the elections in January there was a bot that calculated the running totals every hour. Is there going to be the same thing this time? Fys. Ta fys aym. 00:09, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
User:Oleg Alexandrov ran something with Mathbot, and user:Interiot also had something in January. We could ask them to track this election. NoSeptember 00:13, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
See User:Gurch/Reports/ArbComElections. — Centrx→ talk • 07:54, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
See also User:Mathbot/ArbCom Election December 2006. NoSeptember 13:29, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Can I just ask whether something can be put down somewhere about how status of the voters is being checked? Are there people dealing with this (more organised), or is it meant to be a collaborative community effort where everyone checks the votes (duplicates efforts). Carcharoth 11:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Is it not possible to move discussions that develop on the voting pages to the discussion pages of the vote pages, leaving a link behind showing that a discussion had started there? That would make the voting pages easier to read, and less, well, messy and argumentative. Carcharoth 11:08, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
He vanished from the list. I went to vote oppose on him and now he's gone. Question page is there, but no vote page. He's not in the withdrawn candidates. Anomo 14:32, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
I decided after much thought and the first few weeks of my new job, that it would be a disservice to wikipedie for me to run for ArbCom this year; fearing that my job would require too much of my attention. Perhaps next year, if I have settled into a routine, I will be able to devote the proper time to Arbcom. -- Avi 16:32, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
Can't see this recorded on this talk page or other election pages, so I thought I'd drop a note here in case the example can help in planning for future elections. The issue seems now to be resolved by example from sitting arbitrators. Anyway, the issue of whether and how (comments or no comments) candidates should vote against each other in the elections was raised by Cyde Weys, with sensible concerns about divisive commentary, and contested by Mailer Diablo and Jd2718. See here and here for examples of discussions (now, thankfully, halted). More discussions and history are scattered over the 37 candidate question pages. Anyway, as I said above, the issue seems to have been resolved as (at least 2) sitting arbitrators are leading by example and voting in the elections. Carcharoth 16:27, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
In connection with WikiCast, would someone be interested in getting 'audio' statments from the candidates?
I know some candidtaes are standing in respect of certain issues, statments on WikiCast would give them a chance to perhaps expand on why they are standing...
ShakespeareFan00 20:13, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
May I transclude or link User:DumbBOT/E here? It's a bot-generated summary of the current status of votes. Tizio 12:24, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
Three candidates have now withdrawn after less than two days. At first I was annoyed that I wouldn't get the chance to vote for or against them, but now I realise I can spend more time considering how to vote on the other candidates! :-) Carcharoth 22:15, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
One more candidate gone, now. Freakofnurture. Rather bizarre as well. Some reference to "IRC discussions" and oppose votes numbers 68 and 68 linking to what I can only describe as "swearing by proxy using one's contributions list" (from August 2006) - rather inventive, actually! So those who haven't voted yet now only have 33 candidates to choose from. Carcharoth 17:49, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Please change all writing to past tense where necessary (e.g Voting ran for two weeks.) Thanks, -- WikiSlasher 03:05, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
The page is not a historical record as long as the elections are not over, i.e., new arbitrators are not appointed. As may be seen from the page, new appointments were expected to be announced on Monday. Today is Wednesday. Does anybody know what is the reason for procrastination and where the announcement will eventually be made? -- Ghirla -трёп- 09:12, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
Hopefully the appointments will be from the top of the election winners and non-controversial. My bigger concern is that, as luck would have it, ArbCom has accepted four new cases within the past two days, and looks likely to accept at least two more currently pending applications. If the transition isn't managed well, that means the newly constituted ArbCom is going to start off the year with a huge backlog, which would be highly undesirable in terms of getting cases resolved promptly which has been the biggest problem all year with our arbitration policy. I've left a note for Jimbo urging that he make his appointments as soon as he reasonably and conveniently can so the new arbs can start getting up to speed. Newyorkbrad 21:38, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the graph, trialsanderrors; it certainly mirrors the way I was eyeballing the results. I would say that all of the top seven have clear community consensus to serve on ArbCom, but with six empty seats 7 is a tricky number to appoint since it leaves one Tranche bigger than the others. Jimbo, of course, has a variety of options, but I would say just appoint six and fill any vacancies that arise with whoever gets left out this time. Eluchil404 04:43, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
I wonder when Jimbo will appoint the new ArbCom members, since Mindspillage recently resigned then there should be seven appointed. I think the graph is kind of a good idea and let's see what Jimbo has to say. We shall wait for the results, excited to see who are part of the ArbCom. Ter e nc e Ong 07:45, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
The deed is done! [6] I think that it is an excellent and equitable solution, but the page needs to be updated. I'd do it but my prior unprotection request was declined :-) . Eluchil404 05:13, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Overall the elections went smoothly. However, one thing I believe we should be stricter in next year is moving voter's comments to the talk page. It's probably best to move all such comments, but especially comments that are rather lengthy or contain diffs should be moved. The reason is that opposers tend to use these to cast the candidate in bad light by give a one-sided view of a situation he was involved in, in a manner that the candidate cannot really respond to on the voting page. Voters that feel the need to write a long story about the candidate tend to be people with an axe to grind, anyway. It would be easy to construct a bot to do the moving. >Radiant< 13:16, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
How to run next year's should probably be disscussed at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2007. Geni 16:26, 19 January 2007 (UTC)