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#'''Support''' a serious editor. - ] 00:14, 11 September 2007 (UTC) #'''Support''' a serious editor. - ] 00:14, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
#'''Support''' a very helpful editor. --] <sub>(] | ])</sub> 01:09, 11 September 2007 (UTC) #'''Support''' a very helpful editor. --] <sub>(] | ])</sub> 01:09, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
#'''Support''' Involved in a small way in the '''What the Bleep...''' discussions and found Dreadstar to be intelligent, thoughtful, calm, and very helpful in dealing with disputes. (] 02:23, 11 September 2007 (UTC))

'''Oppose''' '''Oppose'''
#'''Strong oppose''' - This user (formerly known as ]) has quite a long history of being very difficult to work with and conflating issues. There are several examples of this in the past several months which I'll elaborate on. Here he removed another editors comments because he deemed them to be "unnecessary" . There is also the incident of him attempting to get into a debate about the validity of ]'s paranormal challenge on the talk page of the ] article. I replied that it was not the place to engage in such a debate and called the discussion a trifling, which he interpreted as an insult and subsequently edited my post to remove the word he interpreted as insulting, . While the word "trifling" means "of little importance" and have such a discussion on such a talk page was obviously of little importance, I didn't interpret it as an insult. The word might not have been the best to use, however the problem here would be his removal of words from other editors edits and assuming bad faith. He instantly assumed that the comment was an insult without ever assuming good faith. He also decided to engage in a drawn out debate about whether or not what I said actually warranted a "personal attack" which can be found here . This in my opinion shows a lack of judgment. He seems to have a habit of labeling anything he disagrees with "uncivil" and erasing them, as can be shown on his talk page where he frequently removes very constructive remarks from other editors and labels them "uncivil". Examples:, here he removes my comment inquiring about a request for mediation concerning an article labeling me an "abusive editor" and upon reposting the inquiry on his talk page a few days later, he removed it again, once again labeling me an "abusive editor" in the edit summary . Those are just a few examples of such habits. He also has a history of overt edit warring which has been established pretty clearly due to a 3rr block. When his name was ] he was blocked for 3 hours after violating the three revert rule. Diff , Blocklog for ] . He subsequently got into a debate with the blocking administrator disputing whether or not the block was indeed justified , , . These are just a few of the many examples of bad decision making and lack of knowledge of policy exhibited by this user the last several months. This user also shows a tendency to go months at a time without making edits or making only a few edits. This brings into question his ability to be around when he is needed for arbitration matters. For instance between September and October 2006 he made only 23 edits and in the months of May and June of this year he made absolutely zero edits and seems to have disappeared until he appeared again last month making over 2,000 edits. He was a very problematic editor during the time prior to May however upon his return last month he seems to have avoided any disputes and has even engaged in "Admin Coaching" which makes one wonder about his sincerity. Assuming good faith, I will say that this user at least needs several more months of edits prior to becoming an administrator and at this time I'm going to have to strongly oppose him. ] <sup>]</sup> 00:08, 11 September 2007 (UTC) #'''Strong oppose''' - This user (formerly known as ]) has quite a long history of being very difficult to work with and conflating issues. There are several examples of this in the past several months which I'll elaborate on. Here he removed another editors comments because he deemed them to be "unnecessary" . There is also the incident of him attempting to get into a debate about the validity of ]'s paranormal challenge on the talk page of the ] article. I replied that it was not the place to engage in such a debate and called the discussion a trifling, which he interpreted as an insult and subsequently edited my post to remove the word he interpreted as insulting, . While the word "trifling" means "of little importance" and have such a discussion on such a talk page was obviously of little importance, I didn't interpret it as an insult. The word might not have been the best to use, however the problem here would be his removal of words from other editors edits and assuming bad faith. He instantly assumed that the comment was an insult without ever assuming good faith. He also decided to engage in a drawn out debate about whether or not what I said actually warranted a "personal attack" which can be found here . This in my opinion shows a lack of judgment. He seems to have a habit of labeling anything he disagrees with "uncivil" and erasing them, as can be shown on his talk page where he frequently removes very constructive remarks from other editors and labels them "uncivil". Examples:, here he removes my comment inquiring about a request for mediation concerning an article labeling me an "abusive editor" and upon reposting the inquiry on his talk page a few days later, he removed it again, once again labeling me an "abusive editor" in the edit summary . Those are just a few examples of such habits. He also has a history of overt edit warring which has been established pretty clearly due to a 3rr block. When his name was ] he was blocked for 3 hours after violating the three revert rule. Diff , Blocklog for ] . He subsequently got into a debate with the blocking administrator disputing whether or not the block was indeed justified , , . These are just a few of the many examples of bad decision making and lack of knowledge of policy exhibited by this user the last several months. This user also shows a tendency to go months at a time without making edits or making only a few edits. This brings into question his ability to be around when he is needed for arbitration matters. For instance between September and October 2006 he made only 23 edits and in the months of May and June of this year he made absolutely zero edits and seems to have disappeared until he appeared again last month making over 2,000 edits. He was a very problematic editor during the time prior to May however upon his return last month he seems to have avoided any disputes and has even engaged in "Admin Coaching" which makes one wonder about his sincerity. Assuming good faith, I will say that this user at least needs several more months of edits prior to becoming an administrator and at this time I'm going to have to strongly oppose him. ] <sup>]</sup> 00:08, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Revision as of 02:23, 11 September 2007

Dreadstar

Voice your opinion (talk page) (18/0/0); Scheduled to end 18:45, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Dreadstar (talk · contribs) - It is my pleasure to nominate Dreadstar for adminship. He's been my admin coachee for about two months. We've communicated quite a bit over email and on-wiki, and I am confident that Dreadstar is ready for adminship. He has been active since September 2005. (He had 2 periods of inactivity due to being hospitalized.) He has over 16,000 edits (for those who count), has started a number of articles (1, 2, 3, 4, more) and contributed heavily to others (1, 2, 3, among others).

Dreadstar is a friendly and enthusiastic editor. He's not afraid to get involved in contentious articles and policy discussions, and is dedicated to resolving conflicts. He recently contributed to a successful consensus decision at What the Bleep Do We Know!? (see ), and worked on resolving conflicts at Holocaust () and Battle of Washita River (). He has experience vandal fighting (with VandalProof), is active in policy discussion (WP:OR especially), and has participated in AfD discussions (1, 2). I've never seen Dreadstar be less than civil or friendly. He's been active for about two years, and still has energy to engage contentious articles like Psychic, Holocaust, and various parapsychology-related articles. He can only be more productive with the tools. In sum, Dreadstar has the experience and the temperament to be a great admin. --Fang Aili 02:19, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Co-nom by Phaedriel: It's difficult to ask more in a candidate that what can Dreadstar offer. Some time ago, I was lucky to meet him during the dispute surrounding Battle of Washita River, where his thoughtful, kind approach impressed me deeply. The consistent coaching by Fang Aili's (which I have witnessed) has added to a keen knowledge and understanding of policy. Hardly anything to add to the excellent resume that has been accurately outlined above, other than denoting that the Dreadstar is unfailingly kind, helpful, courteous and hard working, and I can personally attest for each of these qualities. It is with pleasure that I present him to you, knowing that, in him, the mop will be in extremely worthy hands. Phaedriel - 05:36, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Co-nom by Anonymous Dissident: - Dreadstar is a very diligent editor and vandal fighter, who has made over 16100 edits overall, 8000 odd of which are to the mainspace. He is a friendly and civil editor, two qualities which are essential in admins. All in all, Dreadstar comprises prime administrator material, and I hope that the Misplaced Pages community shares this view. -- Anonymous Dissident 06:16, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I accept. Dreadstar † 18:45, 10 September 2007 (UTC)


Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Misplaced Pages as an administrator. It is recommended that you answer these optional questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. What admin work do you intend to take part in?
A: Blocking persistent vandals, protecting pages being vandalized, and deleting inappropriate pages that vandals have created would be a welcome enhancement to my current set of anti-vandalism tools (VP). As my nominator points out, I have stepped in on several occasions to stop edit warring disputes and bring the warring parties to the negotiation table, and I would like the ability to protect pages and to block 3RR or WP:NPA violators in disputes where I am not involved either as a disputant or a mediator. I would not use my admin privileges in disputes that I am involved with, I would instead seek a neutral admin’s assistance. I would also like to help clear any backlogs of pages or images to delete, such as orphaned, duplicate or copyright-issue images.
2. What are your best contributions to Misplaced Pages, and why?
A: My best contributions to Misplaced Pages have been my anti-vandalism efforts, the several mediations I’ve handled, and general wikignome activities of fixing things, such as adding appropriate sections, repairing bad links, doing dabs. There are also several articles that I’m proud to have created, such as Charles Banks Wilson.
3. Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past or have other users caused you stress? How have you dealt with it and how will you deal with it in the future?
A: I haven’t been stressed by my participation in Misplaced Pages, although I have been a party to some intense discussions and disagreements. My very first experience discussing a subject on Misplaced Pages was in a highly contentious article, and I have always remained civil and explained my view. I’m not proud of one or two short instances of edit-warring I've been involved in, but I learned a lot from those incidents and instantly regretted my participation in them. When conflicts arise, I step back and try to never answer with anger or frustration. I keep all personal comments out, relying on application of Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. I follow the dispute resolution process and have had great success in focusing on the core issues of a dispute, getting a third-opinion, taking straw polls and gaining consensus. This is by far the most satisfying and successful method of dealing with disputes. Edit-warring is unproductive and scares off contributors, damages the article in dispute, and gets nowhere. Better to have the article protected, and discuss.
My real-life job is in management; managing people, problems, clients and upper management, so I'm very used to keeping a level head at all times. I think my RL experience has translated well into my Misplaced Pages editing, and I'm always looking to better myself. Helping others is a huge part of my job, and I find it to be a very satisfying thing to do...and it's the same here! I enjoy helping other editors.

Question from User:rspeer

4. As you may see from WT:RFA, I am concerned about the growing problem of edit count inflation. Be honest: what techniques do you use to accumulate such a large number of edits? Would you do anything differently if you were not running for adminship? What kinds of edits do you make that require stopping to think about things? rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 20:22, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
A: Quite honestly, I haven't used a technique to accumulate edits. Part of the reason for the uptick in the number of my edits over the past three months is due to my being approved for the use of VandalProof on July 24th. The sheer number of vandalism edits is staggering, and the team of dedicated editors who fight the vandals is a very hard working and noble crew. I'm proud to be a part of the antivandalism effort.
The edits I've made that require the most thinking are the ones during my mediation efforts, the policy discussions, and the AfD discussions I've been a part of. AfDs requre research in order to form an opinion and be able to give an intelligent reason for that opinion. I always research the subject, and in one of the AfDs I've partipated in, I not only performed internet research which revealed that the article subject's school name was wrong, but I even put in a phone call to the Director of the organization to confirm my findings and gather more information.
There is nothing I would have done differently, I would have been doing the same things whether I was running for admin or not. I enjoy doing what I do, or else I wouldn't take the time to do it...;) I haven't done anything to inflate my edit count. I'm running on quality not quantity. Merely accumulating a mass of empty edits doesn't lead to gathering respect from other editors and shouldn't lead to the honor of becoming an admin. I think you can tell from the comments of my nomininators and some of the supporting votes below that I've done more than accumulate an edit count. I find your research intriguing. The graph is well done and I look forward to further analysis on the subject.

Question from AldeBaer

5. Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past? This is not a joke question. I feel you haven't provided a satisfactory answer to this so far.

General comments

Please keep criticism constructive and polite. Remain civil at all times. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review Special:Contributions/Dreadstar before commenting.

Discussion

Support

  1. Support as nominator. --Fang Aili 02:21, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  2. Support as co-nom. -- Anonymous Dissident 06:30, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  3. SupportSeems like a great editor.Rlevse 18:50, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  4. Support See no reason to oppose. LaraLove♥ 19:00, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  5. Support with enthusiasm. Dreadstar gave us a big assist at Talk:Battle of Washita River by setting up straw polling in our article RfC, which helped enormously towards us developing a consensus & putting an end to a lengthy period of full protection on the article due to edit warring. I was too overwhelmed at the time by all the problems we'd had with that article to figure out how to do a good straw poll, or even to realize that was what we needed, so it was really a huge help. I've also been witness to Dreadstar's communications with one of the other editors involved in the Washita dispute, whose habitual incivility had already resulted in a user-conduct RfC. Dreadstar has had dealings with this editor at the Washita talk page, at Talk:The Holocaust, & on the user's talk page, maintaining a firm but patient & civil demeanor throughout, despite plenty of provocation from the other user. Dreadstar is very well-suited to taking on the additional responsibilities that come with admin-ship. --Yksin 19:17, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  6. Support Good editor, see no major concerns. Pat 19:24, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  7. Support No doubt he will make a good admin. Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim 19:32, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  8. Support, per all the reasons stated above, as a proud co-nominator. Phaedriel - 20:00, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  9. Support -- This user will apply the tools intelligently, and appropriately. That's all I ask. --Haemo 20:17, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  10. Support - having become involved in the attempts to unprotect and improve the Battle of Washita River article myself, I can echo Yksin's praises of Dreadstar's conduct, approach, and civility there. Everything I've seen from him makes me confident he has a thorough grasp of WP policies and will apply them fairly and use any new responsibilities wisely. --Miskwito 20:21, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  11. Support You sound familiar. I think we've worked together, and I have no reason to oppose. J-ſtanContribs 20:38, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  12. Support. I was recently just looking around at pages, and I saw his name, was curious, and asked why he was not an admin. Stupid question. Dreamy !$! 20:56, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  13. Support Dreadstar has often helped me in difficult editing situations by giving advice and pointing me to specific policies. I've been impressed with his dedication to Misplaced Pages and learned a LOT from the way he handled the major rewrite of What the Bleep -- an article that had long been contentious and had serious violations of WP:NOR. TimidGuy 21:00, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  14. Support Yeah, of course! Good solid editor with a lovely sense of humour. Scarian 22:16, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  15. Support Good editor, good qualifications, and I trust the noms quite a bit. Jmlk17 22:30, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
    We need experienced editors as admins. —AldeBaer 22:41, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  16. Support all the best 22:50, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  17. Support as excellent editor, no problems, will make a good sysop. Bearian 23:05, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
  18. Support a serious editor. - Modernist 00:14, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
  19. Support a very helpful editor. --Annalisa Ventola (Talk | Contribs) 01:09, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
  20. Support Involved in a small way in the What the Bleep... discussions and found Dreadstar to be intelligent, thoughtful, calm, and very helpful in dealing with disputes. (olive 02:23, 11 September 2007 (UTC))

Oppose

  1. Strong oppose - This user (formerly known as User:Dreadlocke) has quite a long history of being very difficult to work with and conflating issues. There are several examples of this in the past several months which I'll elaborate on. Here he removed another editors comments because he deemed them to be "unnecessary" . There is also the incident of him attempting to get into a debate about the validity of James Randi's paranormal challenge on the talk page of the John Edward article. I replied that it was not the place to engage in such a debate and called the discussion a trifling, which he interpreted as an insult and subsequently edited my post to remove the word he interpreted as insulting, . While the word "trifling" means "of little importance" and have such a discussion on such a talk page was obviously of little importance, I didn't interpret it as an insult. The word might not have been the best to use, however the problem here would be his removal of words from other editors edits and assuming bad faith. He instantly assumed that the comment was an insult without ever assuming good faith. He also decided to engage in a drawn out debate about whether or not what I said actually warranted a "personal attack" which can be found here . This in my opinion shows a lack of judgment. He seems to have a habit of labeling anything he disagrees with "uncivil" and erasing them, as can be shown on his talk page where he frequently removes very constructive remarks from other editors and labels them "uncivil". Examples:, here he removes my comment inquiring about a request for mediation concerning an article labeling me an "abusive editor" and upon reposting the inquiry on his talk page a few days later, he removed it again, once again labeling me an "abusive editor" in the edit summary . Those are just a few examples of such habits. He also has a history of overt edit warring which has been established pretty clearly due to a 3rr block. When his name was User:Dreadlocke he was blocked for 3 hours after violating the three revert rule. Diff , Blocklog for User:Dreadlocke . He subsequently got into a debate with the blocking administrator disputing whether or not the block was indeed justified , , . These are just a few of the many examples of bad decision making and lack of knowledge of policy exhibited by this user the last several months. This user also shows a tendency to go months at a time without making edits or making only a few edits. This brings into question his ability to be around when he is needed for arbitration matters. For instance between September and October 2006 he made only 23 edits and in the months of May and June of this year he made absolutely zero edits and seems to have disappeared until he appeared again last month making over 2,000 edits. He was a very problematic editor during the time prior to May however upon his return last month he seems to have avoided any disputes and has even engaged in "Admin Coaching" which makes one wonder about his sincerity. Assuming good faith, I will say that this user at least needs several more months of edits prior to becoming an administrator and at this time I'm going to have to strongly oppose him. Wikidudeman 00:08, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
    Comment. Your post concerned me enough that I've taken a good long look at the diffs & links you provided. There are some issues I read differently -- for example, his discussion with the admin about his 3RR block doesn't strike me as a "debate" about whether his block was justified so much as an explanation of his own reasoning for the edits at issue, & a good faith attempt to gain an understanding of what his error in interpreting policy was. He remained civil & respectful throughout the discussion -- it read nothing like the "poor victim me" justifications for edit warring I've seen with other people blocked for 3RR. The drawn-out debate about "trifling" was drawn out not only by him, but also by you. I do have concerns about the comment-removals you detailed, & the "abusive editor" statement in made in edit summaries in regards to comments (by you) that did not seem abusive to me... but it's not quite enough to tip me over to opposing his nomination, or even into going neutral on it, given that these instances took place many months ago (in February), & you yourself state that he "seems to have avoided any disputes" since returning to editing. It would be good, however, to have a statement from him about this. I'm not really sure why his participation in admin coaching should lead to questions about his sincerity -- admin coaching seems like a good way to have some guidance toward better understanding policies, including user-conduct policies, so that he can make a good & conscientious admin. I believe he stated himself that his periods of no-edits were during periods of extended illness, which surely admins are permitted to have (not that I'd wish extended illness on anyone). --Yksin 01:54, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
    Correction -- the explanation of absences was actually made by his nominator Fang Aili, who stated "He had 2 periods of inactivity due to being hospitalized." Not quite something I feel fair to hold against someone. --Yksin 01:59, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

  2. Oppose. Looking through his contributions, I find that Dreadstar has spent a lot of his time on Misplaced Pages promoting one side of the paranormal issue, and I'm afraid he would use his admin powers to benefit that point of view. I'm most worried by a comment of his that makes me doubt his interpretation of reliable sources:

    "With paranormal issues, there are generally millions if not billions of people who 'believe,' and a comparative handful of scientists who write or perform experiments to counter or explain those beliefs - so if we take a "majority rules" perspctive, the scientific view loses out. Is the skeptical Misplaced Pages community willing to support that standard in all paranormal articles?"

    I'm reluctant to oppose on this basis, since he is apparently a very fair-minded mediator on other topics, but when it comes to paranormal topics, I am unimpressed with his conduct. He seems to end up in escalating battles that are easy to avoid. Here's one where he changed the meaning of one of his talk page contents after someone already responded, the other person changed it back, and then Dreadstar reported the other person to AN/I over WP:TALK. The misunderstanding would have been easy to resolve without escalation.

    Note that I'm not endorsing the basis for Wikidudeman's oppose above, which seems to mostly be a personal grudge, and ends with arguments that don't even make any sense ("he took a Wikibreak, and that's bad because blah blah arbitration"? "Admin coaching is insincere"? "Editcount-while-hospitalized is too low"?).

    Finally, I am unconvinced by his Q4 answer that his edit count is not inflated, especially since he has a userbox on his page boasting about his count. Though he gives VandalProof as a reason, he has only used it recently, yet he edited at the same frenetic rate in 2006, so it doesn't account for all the inflation. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 01:29, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

    I do agree with you. I have noticed that he has a pro-paranormal slant, though it's pretty obvious if one takes notes of his edits. I wouldn't use that in itself as a reason to oppose him as we all have our biases, as long as we don't try to insert them into articles. Though the problem is that he has on numerous occasions engaged in edit wars and disputes over his personal beliefs, which leads me to believe that he probably would not be a good administrator. He has done some good work the past several weeks but prior to his 2 month long break with 0 edits, he had a long history of disruptive edits and edit waring as well as not assuming good faith, not only not assuming good faith but also assuming bad faith on many occasions. The fact that he's been blocked for edit warring doesn't help the case either. Wikidudeman 01:35, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
    I really wish you would stop saying "disappearance" and "2-month break" in a disparaging context. Those aren't reasonable arguments against adminship. Though I have found some reasons to oppose, I think you're reaching too far to find them. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 01:43, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
    I'd just like respond to the "disappearance" comments: as I mentioned in the nomination, these absences were due to hospitalization, and even if they were not the result of such unavoidable circumstances, it is no big deal for users to take breaks for whatever reason. --Fang Aili 02:13, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
    Administrators need to be around, especially active ones. If an Admin is a part of some arbitration, the admin needs to be able to respond and answer questions and can't take months off at a time. This user has not one but two large breaks of months at a time where he either posts a few posts or posts nothing. This alone though isn't why I oppose. If this were the only thing he'd get a strong support, but this is just one among many many problems that I see with this users edits/editing habits. Wikidudeman 02:19, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
  3. I just spent an hour investigating the validity of Wikidudeman's contentions. Even though I'm a more or less regular supporter, I'm left with no choice but opposing this candidacy at this time. The candidate's behaviour at Talk:Psychic alone casts serious doubts as to coolness and WP:AGF. The valid argument that things like this happened as early as January is in equal validity countered by respective concerns over streaks of near-total absence, sudden change in behaviour and possibly some edit inflation. What tipped it over for me is the candidate's bad memory, or faulty perception, or dishonesty (each not a trait I'd favour in an admin) as evidenced in saying that he "always remained civil", which I find a doubtful statement looking through the diffs. —ˈaldǝˌbæʁ 01:38, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Neutral

  1. Neutral - Somewhat convinced by Wikidudeman's comments, but not enough to oppose. I think contesting a questionable block, while not really productive, is certainly understandable. I think Dreadstar was calling the kettle back slightly in discussions like this one, but I think that's pretty minor. I'm most concerned with the removal of comments on talk pages that Wikidudeman outlined, as I think most of those instances were not clear bad-faith comments and attempting to silence editors can be taken very negatively. Still, I think it's relatively minor. Candidate might make a valuable administrator -- hard to predict preemptively. — xDanielx /C 00:47, 11 September 2007 (UTC)