[WikiEN-l] Turn off AfD

Sun Dec 11 00:23:41 UTC 2005

John Lee wrote:

> The Cunctator wrote:
>
>> Back in the day when the "admin" class was created the claim by people
>> like Jimbo is that in the long run nearly everyone would have admin
>> powers; that it would be no special thing. I was skeptical for obvious
>> reasons. But I'm still willing to believe that's what we're heading
>> towards.
>
> Really? I never knew this. But honestly, I don't see why I anybody 
> could be that optimistic about this. RfA is getting ridiculous. On one 
> RfA (NSLE's), we had an oppose vote because, among other things, the 
> user started thanking people for voting support before the RfA 
> finished. On another, (Mo0's), somebody voted oppose because "your 
> talk page seems to be vandalised a lot" and "we should be erring on 
> the side of caution, and voting Oppose unless we are absolutely sure". 
> Adminship is supposedly not a big deal, but it is. This is even more 
> clear when you look at Requests for Bureaucratship, where many people 
> vote oppose because "we don't need more bureaucrats". I know this is 
> off-topic, but I really think we should be looking into the RfA 
> process as well as AfD, because RfA appears to be becoming the new VfD 
> (yes, VfD). Last time, it was the "in" thing to bash VfD. Now, it's 
> the "in" thing to bash RfA, as anyone who spends some time on our IRC 
> channels should notice. This is worrying. 

Never underestimate the overwhelming power of stupidity.  In more 
dangerous circumstances some of these people woud be candidates for 
Darwin Awards. :-)

I'm perhaps one of the longest standing non-admins on Wikipedia.  I 
turned down the nomination on a couple of occasions.  I have no 
intention to apply in the forseeable future, but I think that the 
inquisitorial process would be a deterent.

Ec