This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

I have a suggestion I've been mulling over for a little while. At the moment, RfA is an election, much as we go to great lengths to pretend it's not a vote; only the closest RfAs aren't decided purely on the numbers. Personally, I think RfA would serve its function better if it actually was a discussion. My suggestion is for a process similar to the old RfC on user conduct.

Instead of voting support or oppose, editors would be invited to create a section giving their view, which would be something along the lines of "I've worked with the candidate at <venue> for a long time, here are some diffs of them doing admin-esque work and keeping cool under fire"/"the candidate single-handedly took Wikipedia to featured article status, here are some diffs of them responding calmly to criticism of their work and resolving their differences with another editor without resorting to four-letter words or admin noticeboards", or "I'm concerned that the candidate has never added sourced prose to the encyclopaedia"/"the candidate handled this dispute poorly [with diffs] and I'm concerned about how they would handle such things as an admin"/"the candidate does not have a long enough track record to know whether they'll be a good admin". These would ideally not be too numerous and come from editors who know the candidate or (for cases like the last example) have extensively evaluated their contributions. Other editors would then endorse these comments as they saw fit; editors who don't want to create their own section but take issue with an existing one could use the talk page or we could have a dedicated section for threaded discussion. Questions could be asked as now. This would give us an indication of whether the concerns outweigh the supports. The discussion would run for a week and then a bureaucrat would assess whether or not there was a consensus based on the endorsements of the positive/negative opinions.

I would hope this would take some of the heat out of RfA that can make it so unpleasant for candidates, eliminate the need to "badger" opposers because editors can just not endorse an opinion they disagree with, and allow for at least as much scrutiny of the candidate (if not more, because it reduces the background noise) as now. I'm sure the details could be thrashed out through discussion, but is this something worth pursuing? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:56, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Most discussions are basically votes anyways, and this one formalizes that reality for a good reason, which is that there is no real applicable PAG on what makes a good leader. Bureauacrats are more knowledgeable on matters of our internal policies, but they aren't smarter or better judges of character. On the other hand, people as a group definitely are better judges than any given person. The current non-existence of formal recall criteria would stop the second a crat struck down an 80/20 RFA on " strength of argument" grounds. Mach61 ( talk) 14:41, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

The best bureaucrats don't draw attention to the fact that they are bureaucrats. Generally, I believe people will not be receptive to the idea of tasking a bureaucrat to subjectively assess the outcome of a non-unanimous discussion-centric RfA unless there is an absolute need to do so. In fact, I'm not even certain that they ought to be reviewing ones in which it appears that there's a strong majority in favor of promoting an admin, even if the outcome looks clear. Mach61 is right; as soon as you have a bureaucrat making a wise and considered decision to decline a numerically strongly-favored candidate due to not seeing a need for the tools, the process goes up in smoke. Supervoting with the best of intentions can and does happen, on nearly all levels, otherwise it wouldn't be bluelinked. _{Duly signed,} ⛵ WaltClipper -( talk) 15:32, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

There was one experiment with this a long time ago, Wikipedia:RFA as RFC/Werdna. I would hope that any new experiment focuses on strengths as well as weaknesses. In any case, the advantage of such a system is that we could discuss issues ("this candidate doesn't do enough BEFORE research", "this candidate is an excellent content contributor") instead of discussing votes. (My personal suggestion would be to have a discussion of issues together with a pure vote, a bit inspired by ArbCom elections. Voting wouldn't need to be secret (just like it wasn't in some Arbcom elections) but more cleanly separated from the discussion). — Kusma ( talk) 16:46, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

For reference, here are a few links to discussions on two-phase RfAs. It hasn't garnered a lot of feedback in any of those discussions. Some have been concerned about extending the length of the request period to accommodate a period of discussion without voting followed by a one-week voting period (during which discussion can continue), to allow for those who only edit once a week to vote. isaacl ( talk) 17:37, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

The most recent major discussion of a two-phase process was of course Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2021 review/Proposals § Closed: 8B Admin elections (apologies for not starting with this link). The anonymous election portion of the proposal, though, generally overshadowed the two-phase portion in discussion. isaacl ( talk) 17:56, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

We may not need need to extent the period by that much if we include a non-voting discussion period up front. I would think a proposal of say 3 days discussion + 5 days (!)voting is workable. That should ensure the same number of people can have their say, even more, even if fewer people (!)vote. Extending the (!)voting bit to the old 7 days would only be a courtesy to voters, not really improve the quality of discussion and ultimate decision. —Femke 🐦 ( talk) 20:18, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

Has converting RfA to a straight vote been proposed recently (and not as elections, such as proposal 8B in 2021)? I wonder if I'm the only one who thinks that an oppose vote is less personal than "oppose because of (list of things that were done wrong)"...

I'm thinking of something where we generally keep the existing format, but supports/opposes are reduced to just a signature. We revive the old-school discussion section for comments and discussion, and we get rid of "general comments" and "neutral". (In order words, rename "general comments" to "discussion" and remove neutrals.) The cut-off becomes 65%, with no discretionary zone; inevitably a straight vote will bring out those who oppose just because. Maxim ( talk) 14:00, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

I'd support this Mach61 ( talk) 14:06, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

@ Maxim the idea that there should just be less discussion was rejected in the first part of the 2021 review. That's the most recent discussion I'm aware of that is beyond the circular discussions we sometimes get on this page where it has been discussed more recently. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 15:37, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

I do not like the straight vote because it does not give an opportunity for candidates to know why people are opposing, and without that feedback it makes it more difficult to improve and be ready for the next run. Instead, I would prefer that replies to oppose votes be banned on the RfA page, and discussions about the points brought up by editors can happen on the RfA's talk page (note: I said discussion about the points, not arguing or personally attacking the person who expressed the concerns.) Z1720 ( talk) 16:18, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

Wouldn't that just fragment the discussion? If you prevent me from replying to an oppose vote, I will use my support rationale to make my point, not a less visible place for threaded discussion. I am happy to ban responses to oppose votes, but then the oppose rationales should not be in the voting section. — Kusma ( talk) 16:26, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

@ Kusma: For my proposal above, banning replies in the oppose section does not stop someone from starting a discussion on the talk page, which would not fragment the conversation. Instead, I think talk page discussions would remove the personal nature of responding to a comment, and discussion would focus on the points or diffs that were raised. Z1720 ( talk) 16:46, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure when or at what page badgering of opposes occurs will make much of a difference; the underlying issue is !voters can't oppose on trust, and moving where or when badgering is placed won't fix that. SandyGeorgia ( Talk) 17:05, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn't discount discussions such as the one you started. Maxim, separating discussion from voting is a frequent suggestion, but not one that has gained consensus support amongst those who like to discuss these matters (and not enough to trigger an independent RfC in recent years; it was raised during brainstorming in the 2021 review and proposed in the 2015 review). isaacl ( talk) 18:30, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Age and adminship states that there have been numerous discussions on age and adminship, while referencing a WT:RFA thread from 2008. This dicussion is about the concept of 12 year olds being admins ( Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Nousernamesleft is an example of that, apparently this used to be a more commonplace occurence). I was wondering if there have been more recent discussions about this topic since then? I can see an older teen possibly being a successful RfA candidate. However, I strongly suspect most voters would prefer admins be adults and that this would likely be a less controversial opinion than it was at the time. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 14:52, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

The number of talented young people in the movement, quite frankly, amazes me. I keep meeting them at conferences. Software developers that just graduated high school that program better than me. Admins who ran when they were under 18 and passed. My advice to young folks who want to RFA would be: keep your age a secret. Then nobody can prejudge you negatively based on it :) – Novem Linguae ( talk) 15:01, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Personally, I've never thought that age should make any difference, other than roles that require more contentious topics (oversighter, check user etc). Realistically there is no requirement for a user to denote their age. Maturity is what we look for. Lee Vilenski ^{( talk • contribs)} 15:04, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

I think that part of the attraction of involvement in Wikipedia to many is that it doesn't matter who you are, in general you will be judged by what you do. Wehwalt ( talk) 15:23, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

There was a shocking amount of ageism in leeky's first RfA. -- asilvering ( talk) 04:00, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I stand by my words and position; name calling won't change that, since I see it as child protection, not ageism. Jclemens ( talk) 04:05, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I asked a variety of functionaries about this not too long ago and was surprised that all indicated an openness to even young teens. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 04:19, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Advice for RfA candidates says "Wikipedia has several very young successful admins; it also has various older people who behave like children." See Greta Thunberg and Donald Trump for real-life examples. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:09, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Notwithstanding the enforcement of COPPA to the extent required by law, candidates should not feel the need to disclose their age and should not be required to answer any such optional questions on that basis. As Novem Linguae said, it is best to not give people a reason to oppose on that basis. I wish I could share the idealism of Lee and Wehwalt in that people on Wikipedia are more apt to judge by actions instead of by status, but in all the years I've been here, I can say firmly that this is not a commonly-held belief, although I too align myself in believing that maturity is more important than age for an administrator. _{Duly signed,} ⛵ WaltClipper -( talk) 14:05, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I didn't even think about the possibility of actually asking a candidate how old they are, I was thinking more about self-disclosure. I think it would be inappropriate at best to ask how old someone is. I understand why someone would rather not say how old they are (preventing assumptions about their behaviour, privacy, general safety, etc) but I also don't think that diminishes the experience of those who do wish to be open about themselves and their experiences. I've always been fairly open about the fact that I created my account when I was 16, for example. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 21:51, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I would advise under-18s not to share their age. Lots of under-18s have better temperament and self-awareness than most adult admins, but won't be supported by adults who have the preconceived judgement that they are "a child". I was under 16 when I joined and I think 80% of what I did wrong was due to the site's learning curve or my own limitations and would have been no better had I been 10 years older. I believe I can often detect when a volunteer is young, but mostly based on humour/socialising/interests rather than any inherent difference in knowledge or skills. We need a diversity of volunteers and under-18s are a part of that. I don't expect to ever support a 12-year-old RfA candidate (or think I ever have done before), but it's old enough to be a grandmaster. I wouldn't rule it out if the candidate showed good temperament, ability to create content and had some experience of the more hostile areas of the site. — Bilorv ( talk) 21:28, 24 December 2023 (UTC)

In general, yes, there are likely to be concerns. One may extrapolate various areas of concern from the Child Protect policy and the referenced Advice page there - there are going to be some number of editors concerned about exposing younger editors to various things and concerned about younger editors exposing themselves. And of course, various editors and admins are going to have various experiences offline, online and here, which are likely to inform their concerns (not only as children, or as parents, but also as professionals who deal with children, their development or psychological issues, etc.) Alanscottwalker ( talk) 22:06, 24 December 2023 (UTC)

I think there are no requirements of being an administrator as long as he/she gets enough experience. However, for some professionals dealing with private data like Checkuser or oversight, 18+ is a requirement to sign the agreement, because of some reasons like Child protection or something like that. But being solely an admin is not likely to be a issue like that. Just a random Wikipedian^{( talk)} 11:00, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

No one said anything about any requirement. What admins are exposed to varies from admin to admin. And the realty is still as I said. No point in being fooled. It has and will matter, regardless of whether any individual thinks it should. -- Alanscottwalker ( talk) 14:48, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

Im not near as active as I used to be on the project, but i actually ran for an RFA when I was approximately a Sophomore in High School ( I'm 30 now), and I believe I would have had a good shot at passing had I not absolutely whiffed on a CSD question. There was one oppose because the user determined I was under 18. (Rightfully so, but I never said it).

I can tell you from my experience at that time, that I wasnt so much interested in being an admin because of what I could do to help the encyclopedia. It was the sense of having that trust from the community and admittedly, a sense of power. Which as a teenager, was obviously exciting. I'm not saying all teenagers are like that, but I can tell you speaking from my experience that I don't know how good of an admin I would have been.I likely would have stayed in my lane of blocking vandals and CSD deletions, but I don't know if I would have had the social maturity to understand and hold conversations on nuanced topics. Maybe some older teenagers could, but I couldnt until I was much older.-- Church ^Talk 03:53, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

I've been thinking about this a bit in recent RfAs...some opposes are not because the voter actually opposes the candidacy but to make sure a candidate sees and deals with feedback. Then a pile-on occurs. In the most recent case, a candidate withdraws with what could arguably be seen as a likely pass. Valereee ( talk) 01:31, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't agree that this characterization applies to Tails or Paine as the two most recent RfAs to withdraw. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 01:34, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, BK49, can you clarify? It looked like TWx withdrew because of a late-in-the-day pile-on? One opposer mentioned not actually opposing at their talk. Valereee ( talk) 01:39, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes. One person did not actually intend his oppose. I believe most, if not all, of the remaining 34 opposes did actually oppose. I think this, in part, given the number of people who were switching from support to oppose. Those are not some abstract opposes. There were growing numbers of concerns that made an impact on that candidate. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 01:43, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

One person affirmed it. Valereee ( talk) 01:47, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

If somebody has constructive feedback but does not actually oppose, they should place their !vote in 'Neutral' rather than 'Oppose'. Giant Snowman 15:26, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

This statement is so patently obvious that any instance of someone doing otherwise must be a mistake rather than a trend. – bradv 15:43, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

I wish it was that obvious, but other editors have noticed it enough to start this thread about it... Giant Snowman 15:46, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

There is literally 1 documented instance of this and the insinuation that it's true for others. I challenge the idea that there is a trend based on such a paucity of data and have presented counter data. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 17:57, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

Or perhaps, if they want to support and provide feedback, they should ... support and provide feedback?? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 ( talk) 16:26, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

As of now, we have 12 successful RfAs and (maybe the 13th one) in 31 December, one lower than the last year. However, we have something to consider:

• The new inactivity policy, enacted on 1 January 2023. We don't know if it has some changes to the admin workload, but many legacy admins have been desysopped this year due to the new activity rule.
• This year had two cratchats (MB: 173/80/15, not promoted in the first days of the year and Pppery: 195/71/9 on August), but most RfAs were uncontroversial, with 2 RFX300s (313/1/2) and (315/3/0), however every RfAs have at least 1 opposes.

And we don't know what 2024 will bring in terms of adminship. (If a RfA nominates today, it would end on 1 January 2024) Just a random Wikipedian^{( talk)} 04:01, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

Following the institution of the new inactivity policy, more than half of all admins are now active. That had not been the case for at least several years. The number of inactive admins has also been halved compared to the last few years. Dekimasu よ! 05:33, 25 December 2023 (UTC)

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the reality is that most admins do very little admin work. Here are the adminstats for the past 3 months. Obviously this table doesn't include items such as closing discussions or Main page tasks, but I still think it provides great insight into the current situation. We've got maybe 100 admins doing 95% of the work. - Fastily 09:14, 26 December 2023 (UTC)

Time to raise it to 50 actions/year. They will have to at least review the latest versions of some of the PAGs to get to the number or risk getting something wrong and end up desysopped. Usedtobecool  ☎️ 15:15, 26 December 2023 (UTC)

Further restricting ourselves to fewer and fewer administrators is not going to help. As with the project as a whole, the long tail of users who might do less work one year and more work the next are still a valuable and important part of the community and creating more work for everyone else by removing their ability to help is pointless unless they're causing demonstrable problems. Sam Walton ( talk) 11:22, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

It is a little alarming to note that despite only having been an admin for about ⅔ of that time, and taking my time getting used to the tools, I still rank #171 on that list. — Ganesha811 ( talk) 04:38, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

It is and it isn't. I was high up on these lists really quick because I deal with deletions. I'd argue I'm not top 10 in terms of active admin contributions, but my count of actions ends up being higher for that reason alone, and I'm right at the 3 month mark as of yesterday. Hey man im josh ( talk) 04:42, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Or you are a fantastic new admin that absolutely crushes backlogs and does a ton of the heavy lifting, and we are lucky to have you :) – Novem Linguae ( talk) 08:29, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

I would argue that judging the work done by an administrator by the number of admin actions performed is just as useful as judging the work done by an editor by edit count. House Blaster ^talk 04:57, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Right, but my point is that the vast majority of admins do little to no admin work, and I'd be willing to bet that this is true for other admin-related tasks not tracked by the adminstats tool. But this isn't actually a cause for concern, given that sufficiently large size organizations/companies struggle to outperform the 80/20 rule anyways. I just don't like seeing alarmist posts about the alleged "lack of admins" and impending doom of Wikipedia because that's simply not what's happening here. - Fastily 11:08, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Actually it is, just very slowly. I've cautioned about this before. There's never going to be a moment when everything suddenly breaks, no "Ah ha!" moment, no blowing up of the Death Star moment that will be clear to everyone that we don't have enough admins. But, we are slowly moving towards that point and have been for a number of years. We've lost a net 828 administrators over the last 13 years. That's almost as many lost administrators as we currently have. The pool of administrators is slowly draining. For now, we're fine. But, that won't last forever. -- Hammersoft ( talk) 17:22, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

To what extent do you think increased automation can slow or mitigate this trend? — Ganesha811 ( talk) 23:42, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

I think automation has already been slowing and mitigating this trend and so the easiest to implement for the largest gains have, likely, already been done. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 01:07, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

That's hard to analyze. Looking at the data used for the subsection below, the number of bot admin functions in the 2018 was 69,042. In the last three months here in 2023, that number was 2,366,857; a whopping 34 times higher. But, the number of human admin functions only decreased by about 9k. I.e., the bot actions aren't having an immediately apparent effect on human admin work load. Though, it's possible to think of it as the bots are doing more than 2 million things humans would have had to do. Bottom line though; human admins are doing about 11% more work in 2023 than they were in 2018. That's the takeaway that worries me. Another one that worries me; the top ten most active admins accounted for 63% of admin actions. We could run this project with 15 highly active admins. But, finding them is a guessing game. Also of note; those top 10 most active admins? Even with Hey man im josh, the average time they've been an admin is more than 12 years. Outside of HMIJ, the shortest time is Liz, at over eight years. I.e., in the last eight years we've found exactly one highly active administrator who has remained on the project out of 119 successful RfAs from 2016 forward. We've lost 2 top 10 highly active admins in the last five years alone. I.e., we're not replacing highly active administrators fast enough either. There's trouble brewing in River City. -- Hammersoft ( talk) 02:02, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Interesting analysis, thanks for pulling the numbers! One thing to take into account is that some people who are not currently highly active may well become highly active if a current "busy" admin retires. For example, I'm sure I'd be doing more AfD closures if Liz so often hadn't got to them first. Not that it's a problem - but it means we likely have current admins who could step up their activity if needed. — Ganesha811 ( talk) 03:37, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

The automation I'm talking about are not just bot actions. But also the way bots and scripts save admins time. So bots clerk noticeboards, so admins don't have to and can, presumably, spend some of that saved time into doing more actions. Same with scripts. And edit filters mean that a lot of stuff that would have required admin action in the past doesn't anymore. I don't see some obvious place where we could automate away admin effort nor any obvious place where there is a lot of admin time and a script could help make them more efficient. The best I can come up with is around AI helping to screen out frivolous requests, CSD, unblocks, etc. Perhaps there could be some work done to automate protection. But I don't see this as some great way to close that gap on its own. At least part, if not all, of the solution is we need more admins. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 05:10, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree fully with this, and I want to add that the places where an admin shortfall does/would have an impact are ones where a single logged action may require hours of reading and unlogged actions; SPI, CCI, AE, and so forth. These are also the venues that deal with our most insidious disruption. I'm not disputing the statistics above; Hammersoft's efforts paint a picture that matches my subjective impressions. I just want to emphasize that the areas not well captured by those statistics are critical ones. Vanamonde93 ( talk) 05:38, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Seven years earlier. I'm saying the same things now. Help! I think I'm caught in an infinite loop. Of note; 8 different editos in that discussion from 2016 are now inactive. So, how many of you responding in this thread will not be active in another 7 years? Ganesha? Hey Man I'm Josh? Sam Walton? Fastily? JrandWP? Barkeep? Vanamonde? Several of you, or maybe even all of you, aren't going to be around in 7 years. -- Hammersoft ( talk) 13:59, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

It is worth noting that of those 2,366,857 bot actions, 2,353,268 were blocks done by User:ST47ProxyBot. That leaves 13,589 non-ST47ProxyBot adminbot actions in the past three months. House Blaster ^talk 19:07, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Does investigating/closing noticeboard threads, mediating disputes, opening/commenting at/closing RfCs etc show up in these stats? For that matter, does closing an AfD as "keep" count? It seems somewhat biased towards being triggerhappy (closing an ANI thread with a block counts as "admin work" but closing it with no action needed doesn't, for example). jp× g 🗯️ 09:08, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, statistics can be fickle things. Many admin actions don't show up... not protecting following a request at RFP is another example. Lectonar ( talk) 09:15, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

It's hard to count (like the 5 checks rule for Checkusers proposed in April this year, many opposed this because rejecting a Checkuser request does not count as a check). So admin actions should be counted as refusals of requests or other things, however. Just a random Wikipedian^{( talk)} 11:13, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

Nearly all of the most time-consuming admin things I do don't show up as admin actions.

I'm also not all that concerned with someone who only has a few logged admin actions a year but is actually editing consistently enough that they're managing to keep up. When they do need to log an action, they're not doing it according to a fifteen-year-old tape. An admin who even a couple times a year correctly blocks a vandal they stumble across is a net positive. One who is so out of touch that they won't even back down when someone objects to an iffy admin move can cause hours of wasted time for other editors. Valereee ( talk) 15:50, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Admins doesn't need to be active with logged admin actions, they would need to get active consistently (maybe have some breaks, but most important of all, they would need to be aware of all new rules and community consensus) to remain accountable. So there are proposals about admin elections because the quality cannot be judged only by some metrics of accountability. Just a random Wikipedian^{( talk)} 02:39, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, one AE comment or close that results in no logged actions can take an hour or hours while clearing out AIV or CSD can take less than a minute per action. Galobtter ( talk) 19:19, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Administrator work; 2023 compared to 2018

I took a look at adminstats for the past three months (thanks Fastily!) and compared it with the same time period five years ago. We have just shy of 14% fewer active administrators. Of the top 25 most active administrators from 2018, we lost 6 (24%). In 2018, the top 20% most active admins did 87.6% of the work. In 2023, that's now up to 94.2%. Losing highly active administrators will now hurt more. In 2018, there were 214,915 administrator actions in the time period. In 2023, it declined somewhat to 206,044. Meanwhile, the number of edits made project wide per day has remained essentially static (days to generate 10 million edits changed by one day). It is not logically valid to conclude we are missing ~9k admin actions these last three months. However, the average number of admin actions per admin in 2023 is 11% higher than in 2018. I.e., the administrators we do have are having to do more work to keep up. Projecting forward; in five years we will have approximately 430 active administrators doing 197,000 admin actions (458 per active adminstrator). The top 20% most active administrators (which will number 86 administrators) will be doing well in excess of 95% of the work. Is the sky falling? Of course not. But, the situation is slowly getting worse. -- Hammersoft ( talk) 17:46, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

I want to say I really appreciate this analysis Hammersoft. Our admin capacity has long felt like a boiling frog situation and this gives some numbers to that concept. Best, Barkeep49 ( talk) 01:08, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Bear with me as I try to get at what I'm wondering here...if I'm performing 11% more admin actions, but because of improvements in (process/tech/whatever kind of streamlining), I'm actually spending the same raw amount of time on those actions, how much actual more time am I spending? I still might have the same back-end not-visible work to do in many cases, of course. Valereee ( talk) 16:03, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe. But there are other possibilities:

• You may be spending more of your Wikipedia screen time on admin tasks and less on other activities.
• With practice, you may be able to perform admin tasks faster

Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:28, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the really interesting analysis here and above. I think in general when people worry about "not enough admins" it's more an expression of a general feeling of "not enough highly trustworthy longterm editors", which is not at all the same as not enough admins. But it is alarming that work dropped by departing highly active admins appears to be being picked up by other highly active admins, and that the success rate for replacing the top 10 appears to be hovering somewhere under 1%. -- asilvering ( talk) 23:20, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

2 new RfAs in progress

And right now, there are 3 RfAs in progress, 2 would end in the new year. I hope that 2024 would be a better year in RfA events. Just a random Wikipedian^{( talk)} 02:40, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

At my own RfA, I said this about badgering opposes:

Perhaps a better question is why we've decided that it is uncivilized to have a candidate respond directly to accusations, but it is highly civilized to have a dozen other people respond nebulously on their behalf. The circumstances behind an oppose vote, especially one based on something that happened a long time ago, are generally arcane and half-remembered even by their participants; why would bystanders be better-equipped to address them? I feel like they usually aren't, which is part of the reason people make up for quality with quantity, and we end up with giant walls of text below every oppose. I don't know how this could be formalized, but it seems to me that if you see an oppose that's so goofy you feel you absolutely must take action, it's probably better to channel your outrage into asking the candidate a somewhat open-ended question that lets them address it.

Anyway, rather than just pontificate on the issue, I am going to do something about it: the next time I see an oppose on an RfA, I'm going to go through and specifically ask the candidate an open-ended question about anything they'd like to say in response to it. My hope is that this will allow people to offer some response if the oppose is total chickenshit, or at least offer a different perspective, and in any case cut back on the need for white-knighting. Since I only get two questions, this may need some cooperation from other editors. Would anyone like to help with this? jp× g 🗯️ 21:48, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't think there is a general view that it's uncivilized to respond to commenters. I do think there is close scrutiny on the candidate's conversational approach, particularly if they seem overly defensive. I'll agree that isn't necessarily giving it due weight compared with the rest of the candidate's body of work. Unfortunately there isn't a good way around this without the community agreeing to delegate the evaluation of candidates to a smaller group. Personally I would like to see candidates decide on a case-by-case basis how to best convey their points, as this is what they will have to do as an administrators. I appreciate, though, why some would like to give candidates a more one-on-one interaction forum in which to discuss a given issue. isaacl ( talk) 22:45, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

I do agree a lot of threads get drawn out by people speculating on how the candidate might respond, and we get towers of speculation that can blow up issues rapidly. It would often be more productive for everyone to wait for the candidate to make a statement before pre-emptively responding. It's difficult to manage without a moderator, though. isaacl ( talk) 22:50, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

I think you hit the nail on the head: people feel a need to defend someone who is unable to defend themselves (or, at least, for them to defend themselves is considered poor form). The person going through RfA knows their responses will be evaluated by !voters. They will not go nuclear over oppose we don't need more administrators, but they can respond to oppose user has not created sufficient content with links to the 15 FAs they wrote.

Count me in. House Blaster ^talk 23:48, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

I'll absolutely be a part of that experiment. There's nothing technically wrong about the above plan, in my opinion, although I suppose one potential downside is that it then effectively forces candidates to respond to those points. And if they choose not to do so, either due to stress or simply not taking the inquiry seriously (or bad-faith reasons which don't require mentioning), that can be a bad look which can impact their future prospects. I think it'd be best to ask (or at least consider) first whether they want that sort of target-setting to be employed. _{Duly signed,} ⛵ WaltClipper -( talk) 14:31, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

In addition, if you couple the above scenario with some sort of moderation plan in that the candidate ought to respond to an oppose !vote first before pile-on refutation commences, that then creates a possibility in which oppose !votes can simply be unchecked if the candidate defers a response. I'm not yet decided on whether or not that's a bad thing. _{Duly signed,} ⛵ WaltClipper -( talk) 14:36, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

• @ HouseBlaster and WaltClipper: I have put my money where my mouth is here, at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Paine Ellsworth 2. This might be a chickenshit question (it's a "which of these four things would you like to address?") so it may need more than one Q to answer fully. jp× g 🗯️ 04:05, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

  Oops: @ WaltCip: jp× g 🗯️ 04:38, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

  @ JPxG: Haha, no worries. The nick change was partly a joke because I kept getting called "WaltClip" up until the day I had it changed. Thanks for pinging me on it. I will have a look. _{Duly signed,} ⛵ WaltClipper -( talk) 13:44, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

  I liked your question and hope to see it on future RfAs. It's a great opportunity for a candidate to take stock of a situation and then directly address arguments while maintaining civility. TROPtastic ( talk) 23:41, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Maybe we should expand the very good essay WP:TYFYV to include a section about not dogpiling regular opposes, rather than just the serial "too many admins" types it was originally written for. The Wordsmith ^{Talk to me} 01:57, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Taking the most recently closed request for administrative privileges as an example: Clovermoss responded directly to oppose statements in a matter-of-fact manner. I do not believe the responses were considered to be uncivilized. isaacl ( talk) 18:37, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

I will note I had a few concerned people reach out to me about how this went against social norms of RfA and that I shouldn't really do that and it might turn the tide of my RfA for the worse.

To be frank, I took opposes as general feedback about my editing and ability to be an admin. It felt somewhat irresponsible of me to completely ignore good faith concerns that I felt warranted some kind of response. In regards to what was more a difference of opinion (like Lightburst's oppose), I was minimal in my responses and mostly was just friendly reminding other people that it didn't need to be some strong back and forth. I didn't respond to Glen's for similar reasons. I took a similar approach with neutrals, too.

I do wonder where the social norms of candidates being "unable" to respond and/or defend themselves to opposers comes from. In most areas on-wiki, addressing good faith concerns is seen as a good course of action. Ignoring them doesn't make them go away and I'd rather speak for myself than have someone try to do that for me (especially if our perspectives on the situation differ). Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 01:28, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

It is definitely not the convention, but I love that you did that. The way you moderated your own RfA showed a lot of strength of character, and demonstrated many of the skills that will be useful as an administrator. I think the usual advice is because we're looking for the candidate to show restraint and impartiality, but, from my perspective, your approach was even better. – bradv 03:31, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

I do wonder where the social norms of candidates being "unable" to respond and/or defend themselves to opposers comes from. It is often perceived as badgering, which can annoy voters and create additional oppose votes. A look at old RFAs can probably find some examples of this. Even a nominator replying too much and with the wrong tone towards opposes can hurt the candidate in some cases. – Novem Linguae ( talk) 04:42, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

The canonical example may be Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/My76Strat; for some history see Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2012-06-18/Investigative report. Folly Mox ( talk) 16:07, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

I've not seen anyone get upset with productive engagement, and it's a good demonstration of the candidate's communication and interpersonal skills. I appreciate some editors are concerned that a candidate may not be able to respond well, but I think it's a disservice to give blanket advice to all candidates not to reply. I agree that it's not productive to try to argue someone out of differences of opinion; as you said during your RfA, it's OK if people disagree. Ideally, responses will provide additional insight into the candidate's reasoning processes. isaacl ( talk) 06:12, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Clovermoss, I think you did a service to future candidates by responding the way you did -- basically, with open-mindedness to the possibile validity of the criticisms rather than with defensiveness -- to show people that a candidate can respond to opposes without tanking the RfA as long as they do it well. Barkeep49 has been discussing for quite a while the value of pushing back on some of these conventions and assumptions. Valereee ( talk) 13:14, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

There are many things that could be better about our processes - ANI is an abomination... but I digress. In RFA we could vote in private like Arbcom voting - There is minimal controversy and kerfuffle involved with private voting. How many food-fights have come from Arbcom voting? In regard to responding at RFA as our system is now, JPxG struck a balance. The badgering does not help anything. I would not change my vote based on public haranguing and I am put-off when comments are hatted and removed from the project page. But again with private voting none of this sideshow occurs. I think some folks look forward to the friction but it is not good for our candidate or our volunteer editors. Oppose voters get blocked all the time, I see Banks Irk was just blocked - I understand they were testy in the TW RFA but again with private voting, the editor is not harangued and is probably happily donating labor to the project instead of being blocked and stewing. My last point is about the MB RFA: with private voting would MB still be editing? Just like OK I lost, back to editing. Instead the RFA page is there for MB to review and read over and over. I know it is not exactly what is being discussed here, but all of the claims that RFA is toxic, RFA needs to be reformed, should the candidate respond? Should oppose voters be left alone? can all be solved with private voting. Lightburst ( talk) 16:21, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Another thing is the refrain of WP:NOBIGDEAL at RFA. If it really is no big deal then we would grant it at perm. I opposed the Clovermoss RFA for the same reason they would have been denied the tools at perrms - they do not hand out tools to people who do not need them. I think these public declarations at RFA - e.g. Super Strong Unequivocal Support might be from editors who have their own RFA aspirations. Or who are afraid to publicly declare issues. If they voted privately they could vote their conscience. Lightburst ( talk) 16:30, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Re the point about private voting, I think we really want to pretend this is a discussion instead of a vote, so making it a vote straight up would be bad. Like many above, I find Clovermoss's replies in her RfA to be quite nice, since it shows us that having a more discussion styled RfA is possible. 0x Deadbeef→∞ ( talk to me) 16:38, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

@ 0xDeadbeef: The feedback that I got from multiple editors was that it is a vote. I will find a link for you. Lightburst ( talk) 16:41, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Basically multiple editors in this thread said that it is a straight vote. Only @ Wugapodes: thought that it was not a vote. Read the comments of HJ Mitchell who said ... it is a vote, RfA is about numbers, not discussion or consensus... Vanamonde, Serial Number 54129, @ Mandruss:, @ RickinBaltimore: all agreed that it is a vote. Lightburst ( talk) 16:52, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Must admit I was a bit surprised by Mitchell's (and it is a vote, RfA is about numbers, not discussion or consensus). If it's not discussion, how do you post diffs to support your position? How do you present arguments that might sway others? Doesn't it become a popularity contest? (That's not all bad; if a majority dislikes you, you probably won't be very effective as an admin.) But his comment was supported by two and countered by zero, and I'm not so smart about these matters, so I went with it. If it's not about discussion, then don't discuss; seems a no-brainer. ― Mandruss  ☎ 17:07, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it mostly appears like a vote, but do we want it that way? IMO discussions are helpful unless they aren't (a useless statement I know) and we'd not want it turn into straight up voting. And that is why I sort of prefers Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship/Archive 267#Making RfA a calmer environment over making it SecurePoll (besides, it might not work well technically) 0x Deadbeef→∞ ( talk to me) 17:13, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Although it plainly is a vote (we give rationales for our votes, but the only thing that matters in the end is the support %; woe betide a 'crat who tries to close an RfA as unsuccessful at 76% or successful at 65%), I'd like to see it become much more of a discussion. Ideally, it would be like the best job interviews—a discussion with the candidate. If voting is necessary or desired, we could split the process in two. That's kind of what I was getting at with my "making RfA a calmer environment thread" but nobody was really interested, which was disappointing. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:38, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't disagree that RfA is de facto a vote, but an RfA has been closed successful at even 64%. Galobtter ( talk) 06:54, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

After a 'crat chat. Could you imagine the uproar if a lone bureaucrat had closed it as successful without a 'crat chat? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:22, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

I mean, my position is not exactly idiosyncratic. The RfA page says verbatim: "This discussion process is not a vote". A thread at AN that ran for a few days is a much weaker consensus than the weeks long, widely advertised, and well attended RfCs that actually determine our RfA process. If an RfC were to come to a different conclusion, I'd change my tune, but despite many peoples' best efforts, no RfC has yet. Until such an RfC, I don't find arguments that boil down to "we should do X because RFA is a vote" compelling; wanting it to be a vote doesn't make it a vote, and confusing the two makes me generally suspicious of whether the rest of the argument treats opinion as fact in the same way. — Wug· a·po·des 06:47, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

A voting process with a numeric hand-count for success or failure is by definition a vote, no matter how many wishful-thinking "not a vote" claims people make or where they get away with injecting them. That the cut-off is a discretionary range, with 'crats having a limited form of veto power, does not change this, and is not unique among voting systems. Lots of delusions are entertained by masses of people, but this does not magically make them reflective of reality.  —  SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  07:23, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Very many (all?) of our consensus-building processes apply numerical assessments, but only after assessing the weight of the opinions of participants, including sometimes discounting or discarding a few based on validity rather than eligibility. That's radically different from a straight vote as it is usually understood - that is, purely numerical. I don't really care what nomenclature we use; the critical point is that it isn't only the numerical breakdown of opinions that matters, but their substance as well. RFA hews closer to a straight vote because there are fewer clear-cut reasons to discount opinions than at, say, AfD; but as long as discounts are applied, it doesn't fit the definition of a vote as I understand it. Vanamonde93 ( talk) 07:45, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping, Lightburst. Firstly, it's probably worth remembering that we may have agreed with Harry, but for different reasons :) my reasoning is, somewhat simplistically, that at the moment, we have a hybrid vote/discussion, and while wanting to be both, it ends up being successfully neither. As both a vote and a discussion, it's polluted. I'm sure this is a perennial, but the best thing might be clear demarcation, Arbcom-esque: four days, say, of actual discussion, which is closed and followed by a plain voting period (although not necessarily a private ballot). Crats would still have a role (indeed, possibly even a greater one) in tying the two results together at closure.

My personal view of the current situation—and circling back to my agreement with Harry's it is a vote, RfA is about numbers, not discussion or consensus—is that it's effectively a vote until it becomes too close to close. Taken to extremes, in fact, it could be argued that the only true element of discussion is also the rarest: the crat chat. Personally, I can't define, for example, something as a discussion just because it contains diffs and links, in the way that I wouldn't call something a vote just because it did not. ——Serial 17:50, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

On a lighter note, should we have a discussion or a vote before deciding how many millions of words we can expound on whether RfA is a discussion or a vote ^FBDB  ;) ——Serial 17:50, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

@ Serial Number 54129: This comes to mind. But I love your idea of four days of discussion. Just like a in a general election there is no campaigning near the polls. Lightburst ( talk) 18:41, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Two-phase RfAs have been discussed a number of times; the most recent discussion on this talk page was in November. It hasn't garnered a lot of feedback over the years, as I discussed in the previous thread. isaacl ( talk) 20:03, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

The topic was discussed at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2021 review/Issues § B. Not enough like a discussion (should be less like a vote) and Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2021 review/Issues § C. Too much discussion (should be more like a vote), with neither view attaining consensus support. The 2021 review did find significant support for anonymous voting (some even think consensus-level, though the closers disagreed). So the day that the counting-heads portion of the discussion is done via anonymous vote may come to pass, once the required infrastructure is ready. isaacl ( talk) 19:57, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

And it will be discussed many times more but we'll probably have the same old RfA in 2043. The "RfA is dying" threads are just too much fun to let something like a solution get in the way! HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:41, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

I think the trend line is there for an anonymous vote, and once that comes in, a two-phase RfA will be a natural element to incorporate. I think the bigger problem is finding volunteers willing to take on thankless tasks that may eat up all their allocated Wikipedia time, preventing them from doing more fun tasks. Given the increasingly shortened length of active tenures for more recent editors, this also means volunteering a larger percentage of their editing lifespan on Wikipedia to drudgery while being a target for antagonism. isaacl ( talk) 23:02, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

The feedback that I got from multiple editors was that it is a vote. In my opinion, it's a vote if it's outside the crat chat range of 64.0 ^[1]-75.9% ^[2]. It's an RFC-like discussion where a panel of closers downweights and discards !votes if it's in the crat chat range of 64.0-75.9%. The panel of closers, of course, is the bureaucrats. – Novem Linguae ( talk) 00:51, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

@ Novem Linguae: I think some like the bloodsport - I see them popping corn when an RFA starts. There are things we do here that I am pretty sure are unique to WP. Like having volunteers flog each other and vote on punishments for each other. Or making volunteers declare and defend their votes for admins. Imagine if you had to do the same at the ballot box in real life. lol FYI: I also want to correct a mistake above: Banks Irk was blocked for an oversight issue. I am just guessing that he got on the radar for his testy responses in the RFA but he was not blocked for his angular vote or testy responses. Also Happy New Year to everyone on the board. Lightburst ( talk) 01:20, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Hi Lightburst. I think you said something interesting a few days ago. I hope you don't mind the wait. Anyways, this is what I thought was interesting: Another thing is the refrain of WP:NOBIGDEAL at RFA. If it really is no big deal then we would grant it at perm. I opposed the Clovermoss RFA for the same reason they would have been denied the tools at perrms - they do not hand out tools to people who do not need them. I know your intention here was that RfA is not at all analogous to PERM but as someone whose actually been an admin for a little over a week now I do have some thoughts on that. I'm not sure how comparable my experience with gaining and losing user rights is... but adminship really doesn't feel like anything super special on top of everything else. There's guides for the new perm, there's a bit of a difference in terms of what I can do... but overall my approach hasn't been that different to what I was like when I recieved other user rights. Obviously there's the potential for harm (that's why user rights like autopatrolled can get taken away if they're abused). So I wouldn't say I think that adminship is no big deal per se because that potential of harm is exponentially larger. To be frank, I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this train of thought but I figured it'd be useful to pitch my input here.

Also, I believe there is a difference between no need for the tools and some need for the tools. I didn't say I wasn't going to be performing any admin actions whatsoever and just wanted to be an admin to be an admin. I did give some potential areas where I figured I could help out easily enough in my RfA. I was wondering if you had any thoughts about what I say at my RfA criteria in regards to editcountitis? The reason I'm bringing it up is because you didn't explicitly refute my central argument there when I linked to it, although I figured we disagreed on something since you didn't change your mind. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 00:24, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

One major difference I perceive is that many admin actions receive little or no oversight, and for deletion it isn't possible for a non-admin to check one's work. Espresso Addict ( talk) 02:51, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure there are a lot of parts of adminship that are very similar to using non-admin rights. But being able to unilaterally decide if an editor should or should not be able to edit here is very different feeling from using any non-admin right. Galobtter ( talk) 02:58, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. I mentioned that in my RfA and I still feel that way. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 03:44, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Below I will reproduce, in its entirety, a successful RfA, without comment:

Zippy

• 21 Jul 2003 Zippy: I've been contributing as a registered user since August 2002 (and as unregistered since June 2002), including both new entries and edits of existing ones. My net identity goes back for more than a decade, with a record of helpful participation on Slashdot and Usenet. I believe in a light touch in moderation except in the case of obvious vandalism (Goatse, bots). My main interest in adminship is in correcting and contributing to protected pages when I spot problems (typos, errors, unclear language).
  • Solid contributor who I don't recall has ever made a non-NPOV edit or has been the instigator of any edit war. I fully support Zippy as Admin. Do I hear a second so that we can make it so! -- mav 19:43 22 Jul 2003 (UTC)
  • Seems to be in a weird time zone, so I don't recognize the name, but checked a few random edits, didn't find anything wrong. Is the sole contributor to at least a couple of short, properly wikified, articles. כסיף Cyp 11:59 23 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Much to think about. jp× g 🗯️ 03:26, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Every time I feel inclined to oppose an RfA on grounds of lack of experience, I recall my RfA, where I'd been active for <12 mths, with ~5k edits, knew tbh next to nothing about deletion policy (where I've ended up working), got asked no questions and got next to no opposition. Espresso Addict ( talk) 03:49, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

For better or worse, Wikipedia is a different community now. For example, the editor in question created an article with their second edit, and it looked like this. Pretty sparse, and without citations, but of course there was no doubt from anyone familiar with the subject that it met English Wikipedia's standard for having an article. A lot of low-hanging fruit was available. isaacl ( talk) 04:16, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Agreed; I'm not sure what we're supposed to take away from this. For example, in 2003, there were ≈8K editors; now there are hundreds of thousands. ^[1] In 2003, there were around 100-200K articles; now there are over 6 million. ^[2] The manual of style in 2003 looked like this. What's most fun to me is the idea of Usenet as a character reference; if I could have done that twenty years ago, I'd be the Final Arbiter of Taste and Justice by now. Orange Suede Sofa ( talk) 05:13, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

The second support was from someone who had checked "a few random edits", I wonder what proportion of current voters actually check the candidate's edits as opposed to just reading the RFA. Ϣere SpielChequers 07:25, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

I do look at some of a candidate's edits. I think it'd be unusual for a !voter to not do that, at least on some sort of cursory level? I also look at their talk page for signs of good communication and decent civility. I get that everyone has different opinions on what makes a good admin ( this is mine) but I think my thought process has a decent chunk of overlap with the general community. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 13:08, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

{|TakesOffSillyHat|serious= "I certainly do. I joke about only looking into user's histories for plant articles, but in truth I'm looking into what kind of interactions they have. Especially if they are dealing more or less fairly with the disruptive editing of various types. Dipping in here and there to get an idea of what they have been doing recently. Now back to your regularly scheduled nonsense."|}

After all I only want either true heroes or villains who follow the code. Can't have someone who'll start bricking up the secret escape tunnel on your evil lair before the fight begins or takes unsporting shots at the hero. And we need plenty of new Supers even if they accidentally vaporize a little public property by accident when getting the hang of the vast powers that come with being an newbie editor WikiSuper. 🌿MtBotany ( talk) 22:51, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

• While yes, the community has changed a lot, so has the type of work and the overall workload of both the editing and the administrator communities. Back in the day, almost nobody was blocked; then again, there were far fewer vandals. Back then, VPNs and other similar proxy servers didn't exist (or if they did, they couldn't be bothered with Wikipedia), so we didn't have adminbots blocking huge IP ranges associated with them, which we do now. Back then, almost nothing was deleted, and revision deletion didn't exist; today, both of those happen hundreds if not thousands of times a day. Back then, AGF was an absolute cornerstone of the project, to the point that people were considered quirky rather than exhibiting problem behaviour; today, we've had an additional 20 years of the reality of the internet that has made us much more realistic and less tolerant of problem behaviours. Back then, it was perfectly fine to have multiple accounts, and the way that those accounts were used had a lot of variation: some had "real" accounts and joke accounts; some had separate accounts for multiple topic areas; some used one account from home and another from work; and quite often those accounts weren't even linked. Today, people have to list every account they have or have ever had simply to be considered for any advanced permission, including adminship (likely with good reason). Back then, the entire editing community probably knew of any other editor who had more than 1000 edits, and so could make a reasonable RFA vote; today, the community wouldn't even consider a candidate with less than 5000 edits except if they had a very specialized skill that required adminship. It's not just the community that's changed. It is the needs of the project, the internet as a whole, and the world in which we operate. The OP illustrates a perfectly reasonable RFA for the period in which it occurred. It is reality that it couldn't happen that way today; but then again, when that RFA took place, everyone editing here was 20 years younger, and a significant number hadn't even been born yet. There's no such thing as the good old days. Risker ( talk) 00:40, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

  I wasn't there at the time either, but I agree with the general gist of the above comment, from what I've read. Just some links though: on 7 July 2003, Wikipedia (in all languages) was the 1,441st most popular site on the Internet, in stark contrast to its very well-assured position in the top ten these days. The next day, on 8 July 2003, it reached 140,000 articles, as opposed to the nearly seven million we have today. Here's the deletion log for the entire month of 2003; the block log doesn't go back that far but here's the blocking policy (for regular users)from around that time and the one for vandals ... in those days, if you blocked an IP address, it would affect *everyone* on it, including admins ... this wouldn't change for another three years). Open proxies actually were a concern by February 2004, when Jimbo Wales said "In general, I like living in a world with anonymous proxies. I wish them well. There are many valid uses for them. But, writing on Wikipedia is not one of the valid uses." (Here's the complete thread). Back in July 2003 we didn't even have an Arbitration Committee, nor did we have a page about sockpuppetry. Certainly different times! Graham87 ( talk) 11:16/11:35, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

  The problem here is that our current rate of granting admin rights extremely low and that creates a feedback loop: RfA becomes more selective, old admins become less willing to nominate someone for RfA, people becomes more critical of newcomers. There WAS the good old days, and Wikipedia has become unkind to new editors, new blood, and new talents. CactiStaccingCrane ( talk) 06:13, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  When people speak of the good old days of RFA, I'm reminded of my RFA standards page, which stands unchanged for fifteen years. Would someone today pass RFA with what I have listed there? No. Has Wikipedia changed, as described by Risker above? Yes. Has RFA changed in a properly commensurate way? You'll get different answers from different people, but if you ask me, the answer is no, the curve at RFA has been steeper. Useight ( talk) 18:06, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

  An observation: The cases that involve admins or admin-candidates with conduct unbecoming surely are not to be representative of the majority of the admin corps who do great work. Yet it may be that jarring spectacles such as the Eostrix RfA where an LTA was almost given the tools (but for sharp-eyed CUs) may leave a lasting impression of how weighty and awesome a process that RfA can be. It concerns me that the presence of such cases may indeed prompt !voting editors to err on the side of caution. That could contribute to the steeper curve, among other reasons, another one being a greater concern for maintaining editorial integrity within an encyclopedic landscape that is rapidly shifting due to the impacts of AI and LLMs. _{Duly signed,} ⛵ WaltClipper -( talk) 13:47, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

  Any of you watch The Traitors (or any of its other international versions)? The "faithful" in that show trying to oust "traitors" based on vibes feels a lot like trying to identify the next Eostrix or Icewhiz based on an interaction you had with them once. Eostrix was identified with tools that probably should have been applied before their RFA went live (though obviously I get that catching them was a case of luck as well), not by vibes being "off". FOARP ( talk) 21:13, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

  Every time in the last ten years when I asked someone whether they'd like to be nominated, they said no. In the good old days, people often just nominated without asking first... — Kusma ( talk) 22:19, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

• Just to say that Zippy is still an admin 20 years later, with a few edits in 2023, though his last was in September. Johnbod ( talk) 23:59, 7 January 2024 (UTC)
  • 3450 edits total. Are there any other current admins with a lower count? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 ( talk) 11:03, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
    • The current admin with the lowest edit count, excluding bots, is Lustiger seth with 757 edits (with a restriction that limits their use of adminship to just the Spam blacklist). Next is BradPatrick with 1182 edits (promoted without going through RfA at all as a special case). Next is Sugarfish with 1587 edits, who appears to have had a normal-for-its-time RfA. There are four other admins I haven't listed with fewer edits than Zippy, one of whom is actually still regularly performing admin work. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 00:52, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

      Thanks. Lustiger seth is pretty active on the German Wikipedia, their home project. Ymblanter ( talk) 19:42, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Anyone object to simply removing those questions? Valereee ( talk) 11:53, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

Their first question has a blatantly obvious answer, and barring some episode were their brain was removed, Sdkb would answer it correctly. The second question isn't articulated properly. It lacks specificity. In fact, so much so that in my opinion the question is meaningless. Sdkb would have to flesh out a number of possible scenarios that would apply before being able to answer. More importantly, the question is pretty blatantly coming from a person who is a long term abuser. Not surprisingly, the only edit done by the IP tripped the edit filter [1]. The questions do nothing to add to the RfA, as they are rather meaningless. The IP is likely an LTA. Answering the questions is feeding the troll. I strongly lean 'remove'. -- Hammersoft ( talk) 12:54, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

Just to be clear, this is about [2]. This process should not involve having to answer WP:POINTy/ WP:SOAPBOXy questions from anonymouses who have nothing to lose from trolling. -- Joy ( talk) 13:48, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

And they've been removed by Acalamari. Good move. -- Hammersoft ( talk) 14:49, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

A discussion is taking place at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Community sanctions: rethinking civility enforcement at RfA. Interested editors are invited to join the discussion there. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:25, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

You are invited to participate at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2024 review :) theleekycauldron ( talk • she/her) 08:28, 20 February 2024 (UTC)

Hello everyone. I just wanted to make a note and say that I am very thankful to every single person who has seen my work, supported, guided, and helped me over the last 13 years since I have been here on Wikipedia. I have learned a lot here, but there is still a lot to learn and experience here on Wikipedia as an editor. Wikipedia has given me tremendous knowledge, and I will always be there to serve Wikipedia as an administrator till the end of time and till my last breath. I will run for RfA one day when I am ready. Thank you. TheGeneralUser ( talk) 23:10, 19 February 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. That's good to know. Deb ( talk) 09:14, 20 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for your acknowledgment Deb. TheGeneralUser ( talk) 11:00, 20 February 2024 (UTC)