Wikibooks:Requests for permissions/Xania

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Whilst declining my original nom for Admin I did acknowledge that there was ample work to do and few people to do it. So, while watching RC for vandals, I spent (& still spend) quite a bit of time looking for admin material. Xania is the best one I've come across. He has been around longer than me and recently has taken a real interest in matters about the project as a whole. However he is also a real editor with good work in both Cookbook and Wikijunior. I find his approach to be fresh and he has a will to get things done and there is plenty to do (if he realises what he is letting himself in for he may decline but I hope not). There is more than enough work for another active admin to do and I strongly recommend him to you. --Herby ^{talk thyme} 13:13, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Candidate acceptance here - I accept this nomination although I think I have a lot to learn! Xania 20:06, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Questions & Discussion

• Votes
  • Support -- Experienced RC patroller, always acts in good faith, and is clearly interested in ensuring the success of both wikijunior and wikibooks as a whole. Also active on our IRC channel, so I know he thinks before he acts (he often runs ideas by other wikibookians before implimenting them), and will know where to contact mentors when he needs them. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 22:28, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Wholehearted agreement. I would have voted earlier, but I didnt see the nomination. You may have alot to learn, but there are plenty of people around who you can ask for help in a pinch, myself included. Don't be a stranger! --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 04:24, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Xania has always been friendly, engaging, and engaged in the project. Is willing to work on tedious tasks like RC patrol, is active on the IRC channel, and is willing to ask questions and learn. --Iamunknown 22:46, 8 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Conscientious. --xixtas 00:37, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support --Swift 04:55, 9 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support --Panic 03:01, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Done. This user is now a sysop. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 15:04, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Per policy on inactivity: "There are no hard and fast definitions on what it means to be "active" but a good guideline is to have at least 20 edits in the last year and 1 edit within the past month. Even this might not be enough, if administrator privileges have not been used (or not been used correctly) within the past year."; only two admin actions were performed in the past year (see activity) on the same day in August. There were many edits in December, but over a month ago. Over the past year, no presence seen in Nov, Oct, Sep, Jun, May, Feb, Mar. No response seen on talk page or received via email to my initial note of concern. Thus, I feel Xania has become inactive and wish to reconcile the technical number of administrators with the actual number of administrators present on a regular basis. – Adrignola talk 03:00, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose Looking at some other (conveniently documented) cases of de-admin for inactivity, this seems to be a substantially more aggressive enforcement of the heuristic. I don't readily uncover evidence that the "in the last month" part of the guideline has been enforced. At least one admin action in the past year, yes; at least 20 edits in the past year, yes; at least one edit in the past month, no. Granting that no response to a query in a week isn't a plus, I see one of the archives of this sort of thing talking about a month's notice before action was taken. The two admin actions seem to suggest a deliberate effort to maintain admin status. And I'm puzzled why Xania is the focus here, when Reece has also had two multi-month edit-gaps in the past year, and Reece's most recent edit was the day before Xania's.

The more tolerant approach that's been taken in the past seems to me to have worked just fine; and for that matter neither Wikinews nor Wikiversity has any inactivity criterion for de-admin, so we're already far harsher than they. I see no reason we should up the ante on a device that's been performing admirably. --Pi zero (talk) 05:36, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Substantially more aggressive? Two admin actions in the last year on a single day is just fine by you? The initial notice to Xania was more of a friendly query to see if a formal nomination would be unnecessary. This nomination would stand for 30 days before anything is posted to Meta, as per policy, which is the month's notice before action is taken that you talk about. "A deliberate effort to maintain admin status": gaming the system—make a couple deletions and you're good for a year. There's no hard and fast definition on what it means to be active, but I consider this to be inactive because it's not just absolute numbers—it's also about frequency. Others' focus on those absolute numbers, though, is why I've nominated Xania and not Reece—2 versus 22 at this time. Believe me when I say Reece would be next up when I look at 6 month levels. – Adrignola talk 14:01, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I was interested in several separate points, but I presented them in a rather jumbled way, so I've only myself to blame if they haven't magically separated themselves out from one another.

• The notice period business is clearer for your comments. Let's set that aside for now. (I've absolutely no idea whether for some reason it will come up again later.)
• I'm most interested in the question of what standards have been applied in the past versus what standards you are applying now. There are at least three ways you could address this:

• (A) You could make a case that the standards you are applying are actually in line with those that are historically well precedented. Although this was distinctly not the impression I got from the historical spot-checking that I did, my checking only covered a few scattered cases; digging up much historical data on this is tedious, because (a) our RFP archives are, as far as I can see, only available alphabetically, not chronologically, and (b) many of the de-sysops seem to have been done without leaving any record at all in those alphabetical archives.
• (B) You could make a case that we should be applying stricter standards than has been done historically.
• (C) You could make a case that, regardless of precedent one way or another, such-and-such is the standard we should be applying. I actually think this would be the most difficult of the three, because the question of how it compares with historical precedent would be the elephant in the room.

It's also possible to do some mixture of (A) and (B). I still think, though, that clarity is needed as to when one is addressing (A) versus when one is addressing (B), to keep the discussion lucid (lucid to me, anyway :-).

• Here's a bit of objective data, for whatever we can make of it. By the end of this month, supposing no further edits,

Xania will have made 41 edits in the previous year.

Reece will have made 63.

(Recent Runes, no issues: hundred of edits, no gaps.)

Az1568 missed March and June–July, and will have made 23 edits; an interesting case, more admin actions than edits.

(Pi zero, no issues.)

Swift missed April, July, and September–October–November.

TheNub missed March and almost February (edits on February 1).

(Darklama, no issues.)

(Jomegat, no issues.)

(QuiteUnusual, no issues.)

(Adrignola... too hard to check the months: 5000 edits only took me back to November. :-)

• It's interesting that you see 'gaming the system' where I see 'evidence of caring about adminship'. Presumably this is a difference in our interpretation of the spirit of the guideline.

--Pi zero (talk) 17:59, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I imagine the reason there isn't much data to go by is the policy does not require any discussion or any further consensus, just listed and wait 30 days. I think there has been one vocal objector in the past, but their issue was with the policy itself and they objected to every nomination based on inactivity for a time. That is just my having been around awhile and recalling from memory perspective though. --darklama 19:08, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Robert Horning's inactivity might qualify as being similar. He hadn't edited in over a year, but had used the admin tools once in the past month and before that over a year since the tools had last been used. He also did not like the policy of removing tools from inactive admins, but despite that accepted it as the community's decision. --darklama 19:49, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Alas, Robert Horning's case doesn't bear on my point. It's based on number of edits in the last year, which is the one part (out of three) of the guideline that I do not suggest is being used differently in this nom of Xania than it has been used in the past. I'm suggesting that this nom

• places heavier emphasis on "one edit in the last month" than has been done in the past, and
• asserts (as seems to have emerged from subsequent comments) a higher standard for admin activity than is expressed or implied by the guideline or than has been used in the past.

To be extra sure we're on the same page: there's no disagreement with the policy here. I'm suggesting this is a deviation from long-standing practice for implementing that policy, which calls into question whether this nom is de facto in line with the policy. I'm open both to being convinced that I'm wrong about long-standing practice, and to being convinced that we should adjust long-standing practice. --Pi zero (talk) 21:17, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't had a chance to go through all the archives for (A). On (B), and regarding the spirit of the policy, my emphasis is not on edits; it's on "this might not be enough, if administrator privileges have not been used" in the policy. Look at Az1568. What if the number of edits were below 20 for the past year but admin tools were still used? Tools still would be used in that case, despite lack of editing. It comes down to whether the policy is specifically for activity in general or activity as an admin. There could be no further use of the tools and the strict interpretation would require waiting until August 2011 for the two actions on one day of the entire year to clear out.

My background was influenced by a statement Mike.lifeguard made to me for Krischik in the past as a young grasshopper (cite): "the pattern of token admin actions which don't actually help the community yet are precisely why we don't have a set number. The policy is set up such that you cannot game it by showing up yearly to delete one page and thereby keep your tools forever. Whether they were deliberately gaming the system or not, the result is the same - no actual benefit for the community - thus removal." – Adrignola talk 22:45, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I guess I might be able to see how Pi zero might of seen edit counts as being more emphasized. I have no idea if the person who use to object to ever nomination stopped because they got tired, left, or liked the change in presentation, but maybe a just the facts approach without appearing to decide anything would help (at least that is what I did when I first began to bring them up):

Last Edit: December 3, 2010. August 6, 2010 before that.

Last Action: August 6, 2010 (2 times). January 11, 2010 before that.

--darklama 23:24, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm hoping to find time tomorrow to research both debate surrounding the creation of the policy, and stats on what a broad sample of inactives had done during the year before they were de-admined. Anything else I could say at this point seems unproductive compared to those substantive data. --Pi zero (talk) 03:43, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

┌───────────────────────┘
First stirrings. Call for guidelines. Removal added to proposed policy. Added to policy. Practice reviewed. Affirmation. – Adrignola discuss 17:54, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Here's a list of early discussions I've found about the policy, at places other than RFA; this list might be useful in the historical record of this nom, anyway, even if it is too long to read. I tried to at least skim it all, but my skimming wasn't in chronological order, and I admit my eyes tended to glaze over after a while.

Aug 2005 ; Feb 2006 ; Jun 2006 ; Aug 2006(a),(b),(c) ; Oct 2006(a),(b) ; Feb 2007 ; Apr 2007 ; Oct 2007.

To relate all that to the detailed form of the guideline, it's going to be necessary to correlate it against the revision history of WB:Administrators. Without the correlation it's hard to know exactly what some comments even mean. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 18:02, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I suppose more precisely the show of support and my continuation of the process after two people were asked to recuse themselves affirmed continuation of this process. --darklama 18:10, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Rough first steps with Cyp, Eclecticology, Maveric149, Marshman, KelvSYC, Traroth, and Andreas Ipp (several failed on first nomination due to conflict over precedent). Removals due to inactivity with edits in past year: Karl Wick, Perl, Omegatron, Garrett, Uncle G, Ђорђе Д. Божовић, and Kellen. Removals due to inactivity with admin actions in past year: Robert Horning and Krischik. A previous questioning of my interpretation. – Adrignola discuss 18:32, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Xania has made a reply to my original query. – Adrignola discuss 14:10, 21 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not going to oppose my own nomination but I would like to add that I have been active pretty much every day making the odd minor edit and patrolling the RC. I haven't logged in or had to use my tools too often as is evidenced in the log. I did read the message on my talk page (but only just responded) but I wasn't aware that an "official" removal request had been made as no such notice was posted on my talk page and I (for some reason) don't have Requests for Permissions on my watchlist.--ЗAНИA ^talk 14:12, 21 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As I consider Xania a Wikibookian in good standing (independent of the question of inactivity), I accept xyr word regarding non-logged-in activity, and therefore consider Xania to be active. Based on comments by Whiteknight when the inactivity guideline was being put in place, I believe that Xania's admin actions in the last year do satisfy the intent of the admin-action part of the guideline (Whiteknight's comments suggest that it was intended to be about as weak as the wording of the guideline actually is). So my "oppose" vote on this is now much firmer than it was — although, on a much less "urgent" basis, I still mean to eventually gather together usage profiles for past admins at their times of de-sysop for inactivity, as I think that should be very useful information to have on hand when these things come up. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:11, 21 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Without any support for a more liberal interpretation of policy, with no disagreements put forth with Pi zero's position, and combined with Xania's recent statements, I am inclined to withdraw the nomination at this time. It was intended to be procedural and should not be construed as a reflection of personal opinions toward Xania in general. – Adrignola discuss 03:06, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose Not sure if my vote matters at this point, but I had the pleasure to work with Xania on the Manx project and I also had the unfortunate lack of activity in the year crisis but if we can learn anything about great Wikibookians is that we all come back when we have time. Xania should keep his/her sysop rights in my opinion. :) --Girdi (discuss • contribs) 23:54, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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