Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 17:06, 3 July 2016

BU Rob13

Voice your opinion on this candidate (talk page) (78/5/1); Scheduled to end 00:56, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Nomination

BU Rob13 (talk · contribs) – I'm very happy to nominate BU Rob13 for adminship. I first crossed paths with Rob at TfD, where he's been a standout among the non-admins active in closing discussions. It's very largely thanks to his efforts that the backlog there has shrivelled to near-nothingness. To put that in perspective: there are currently 0 TfDs over 7 days old. Back in September when Rob was just starting to get involved, there were 43 discussions with the oldest over two months old. Rob was then an experienced TfD participant already, but after his first handful of TfD closes, he went out of his way to ask me for a peer review to get feedback on his work. Looking back, that's when I thought "OK, this guy is going to be good admin material eventually." Since then, he's done hundreds of relistings and closings at TfD: I counted over 200 and only got back to April. Even in complex discussions, he gives clear, concise, and thoughtful closing summaries, e.g. here.

Rob is also an active closer of RfCs and more recently CfDs (see co-nom). If someone questions a close he's made, he's consistently civil, collaborative, and willing to offer clarifications on his closing comments (e.g. here) or help broker a better compromise solution (e.g. here). His overall record makes him already more experienced than many admins at closing discussions.

In addition, he's a productive content editor, with three GAs and 39 DYKs to his name, and 101 new articles started - most of them BLPs, all of them solidly sourced. He runs a bot, User:BU RoBOT, which does a lot of wikiproject tagging and template maintenance, and he's a template editor who's taken an interest in issues related to accessibility.

So that's the wiki-resume part, but if you really want to know why you should support him, here it is: Rob has Clue. He's mature, thoughtful, and practical; he seeks out and responds well to feedback; he's versatile and makes quick work of moving up the learning curve in a new area. We have a lot of backlogs and not enough admins, so let's give a low-drama, high-productivity, proven backlog-clearer a mop. Opabinia regalis (talk) 07:23, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

Co-nomination

BU Rob13 (talk · contribs) – I am so pleased to co-nominate BU Rob13 for adminship. Currently, I am one of the few admins that is primarily engaged in closing discussions at categories for discussion (CfD). Responding to a CfD backlog in recent months, Rob has been active as a non-admin closer there. As with TfDs, Rob has been a major factor in reducing the CfD backlog to a more manageable state. When I began to read through Rob's closes, I was immediately impressed, and have never been disappointed in reading any of his closes. What a fast learner he has been! He has demonstrated a natural ability to discern consensus (or lack thereof) in discussions which are often complex and far from clear-cut. On more than one occasion, Rob expressed insights and solutions to implement the underlying consensus that had not occurred to me. Considering that I have been closing CfDs for a number of years now, I regard this as quite marvelous and I believe that he would be a fantastic addition to our presently small corp of admins who can help manage CfD. In short, he already has all the skills of an effective CfD closer, he just lacks the complete set of tools that would allow him to fully carry out the role. (One specific reason I would like to see Rob become an admin: in order to effectively process closed CfDs, an editor needs to be able to edit WP:CFDW, and that page is typically protected to allow only admins to edit it.)

The overall impression of Rob's character that I have received in the time I have known him is one of calm thoughtfulness and kindness towards other users. Has has not agreed to accept this nomination because he is power hungry or wants the praise of others—he sincerely wants to assist with the project to the extent that he is able and get some work done!

Perhaps most remarkably, I have observed in Rob a characteristic that is perhaps the rarest of all the rare attributes of Misplaced Pages users: he can change his mind, and admit that he has done so (eg, ). This demonstrates a level of maturity and a willingness to consider new information and reassess his assumptions and understandings; it is essentially the "secret sauce" of how to be a truly great Wikipedian and admin.

I therefore give my highest recommendation and endorsement to you in co-nominating BU Rob13 for adminship. – Good Ol’factory 23:09, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: Thank you both for the nominations. I accept. ~ Rob 00:58, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Misplaced Pages as an administrator. Please answer these questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. What administrative work do you intend to take part in?

A: I intend to continue my work at WP:TfD and WP:CfD. In both areas, it would be useful to be able to directly delete the templates/categories after orphaning or emptying instead of tagging them as G6, and this would be my primary use of the tools. In the future, if backlogs develop, I may get involved in helping at WP:MfD or WP:RfD. I'm familiar with MfD already. I don't know too much about RfD right now, but my approach there would be similar to CfD; ask the regulars what I should read before jumping in and then seek feedback from them after a couple dozen closes. I'd also like to mention what I don't plan to get involved with. I have no interest in regularly helping out at WP:ANI, WP:AIV, WP:UAA, WP:AFD, or WP:AN3. I also don't plan to become involved with speedy deletion. These are all areas where I feel we have enough administrators at the moment.

2. What are your best contributions to Misplaced Pages, and why?

A: On the administrative side of things, I tend to go wherever more volunteers are needed. I'm an active closer at both TfD and CfD. Non-administrators are able to close as delete at both, as editors must orphan the template or empty the category before deletion, and this step doesn't require the mop. See this RfC for TfD and the CfD closing instructions for more details. Most recently, I cleared a backlog of over 200 discussions at CfD over a period of two weeks. I'm certainly proud of my backlog-clearing efforts in these areas, but my greatest achievements on the project are my three GA credits (Corbin Sharun, Calvin McCarty, Garry Williams (gridiron football)) in addition to my four GA nominations currently going through the process (Marcus Adams (Canadian football), Kojo Aidoo, Tony Akins (Canadian football), Ted Alford). My content creation efforts are all in the topic area of Canadian football.

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: One of my early conflicts was over the article Carnism, which I nominated for deletion. When I nominated it for deletion, it was a POV-filled mess which had been previously deleted at two deletion discussions. Within two days, the article was entirely rewritten with a greatly expanded scope. Quoting my own nomination withdrawal, "This article has been expanded from "carnism as a word to describe vegan outrage towards most people" to a more complete and neutral debate regarding the ethics of eating meat. I still think it has some neutrality issues, but the expanded article and definition of carnism meets GNG." I proceeded to place a POV tag on the article and work with several editors on the article's talk page to ensure its neutrality. You can find our efforts at Talk:Carnism/Archive 1 and (to a lesser extent) the later archives. While some editors weren't happy that I placed the POV tag, we all worked together productively and everyone went home satisfied.

I've been in more recent disagreements relating to how drafts should be treated when they have little chance of benefiting the project and, oddly enough, train route templates. My general conflict resolution strategy is to step back, try to see the other editor's perspective, and then work to bridge the gap between mine and theirs. Sometimes, I pull the other editor onto my side. Other times, I find myself rethinking things.

You may ask optional questions below. There is a limit of two questions per editor. Multi-part questions disguised as one question, with the intention of evading the limit, are disallowed. Follow-up questions relevant to questions you have already asked are allowed.

Question from Newyorkbrad:

4. The cynicism (and nasty edit summary) of the one opposer so far are unfortunate, but I'd like you to have an opportunity to address his concern without being accused of "badgering." Please feel free to do so here.

A. This is not the first time an editor has expressed these concerns. It's difficult to remember exactly how I got into different areas of the encyclopedia when I was first starting out, but I did write a very comprehensive explanation of many of the ways I got involved at Misplaced Pages:Bots/Requests_for_approval/BU_RoBOT_2 when questioned about this same subject. I'll have to defer to past-me on the minor details. Too much has happened in the past 12 months to remember how I first got involved with AWB, etc. Looking through my own oldest edits, I do struggle to see how they could be considered the edits of an experienced editor. My first edit at TfD was more-or-less an WP:ILIKEIT argument which demonstrated no understanding of the purpose of infoboxes, which are certainly not there to list every accomplishment a person has ever made. I think I came to that TfD discussion after seeing a notice on Amy Poehler's article, but don't quote me on that. It could have been Tina Fey or another female comedian. My first attempts to help out at WP:TFD/H, which I discovered from the aforementioned TfD discussion, included nearly 20 minutes between extremely simple edits that I could now complete with AWB in seconds or without AWB in no more than a minute. When I first tried my hand at new page patrolling, I incorrectly applied CSD tags and was called disruptive due to my lack of understanding of WP:BITE. I don't believe I took off with a running start, by any means. Heck, I even nearly left entirely out of frustration because I didn't understand the CSD criteria early on.

Still, I did acquire knowledge fairly rapidly. I'll quote myself from the previously-linked BRFA on this subject: "There's an open secret that most editors don't appear to know about; editing Misplaced Pages is extraordinarily easy. It takes around 30 minutes of reading the most basic policies and a willingness to read the more obscure policies and essays as they are linked to you when you make mistakes." That more-or-less describes my current editing strategy. It's how I got into CfD. Three weeks passed between the time I first read WP:CAT/WP:OVERCAT and the CfD backlog being almost entirely cleared. With a few exceptions, it isn't difficult to become an "expert" in almost any area of Misplaced Pages given three hours of reading time and a willingness to ask questions.

At the end of the day, it's impossible to prove that I'm not a long-banned editor here to carry out a dastardly and almost bizarrely long-term plan to temporarily delete a couple articles or something before being swiftly desysopped, blocked, and reverted. The closest I can come is attaching my real-life identity to my account, which is something I've done privately with several trusted editors who I've had email correspondence with. Both of my nominators have corresponded with me through my university email, which is easily attached to my real-life identity given the knowledge that I'm a graduate student in economics. Outside of that, all I can point to is my many contributions that have added value to the encyclopedia. Apologies for an unusually wordy answer, but this is an unusually difficult question to answer given that an assertion of sockpuppetry can never be affirmatively disproven.

Question from Altamel:

5. As you might recall from a recent ANI discussion, I remain very concerned about applying extended confirm protection to articles. If I remember correctly, you explained that combating persistent sockmasters was a massive timesink, and I fully sympathize with your argument that 30/500 is an attractive solution. However, I'm still worried that 30/500 will drive off potential new contributors, since editing extended confirmed articles requires a much longer tenure than with semi-protection. From the glut of outdated (but vandalism-free) pages I've come across while editing, my gut feeling is that Misplaced Pages continues to attract recent changes patrollers and "maintenance-oriented" users, but attracts content editors at a much slower rate. This heightens the damage that would result from driving away new content editors. Now, as an admin, it is highly likely that future community consensus will allow you to impose 30/500 protection at your discretion, so what are your standards for deciding when a situation is so serious as to merit extended confirm protecting an article?

A. I consider it appropriate to use 30/500 protection on articles that have been the target of persistent sockpuppetry using "sleeper" accounts if the disruptive edits are unlikely to be caught by editors unfamiliar with a long-term pattern of abuse. When autoconfirmed "sleeper" accounts are curated by a sockmaster to attack semi-protected articles, semi-protection is no longer effective. Our only remaining options are to combat the vandalism as it pops up in recent changes, apply full protection, or apply 30/500 protection. Out of those options, 30/500 is obviously preferable to full protection. If the vandalism isn't sneaky, then we can rely on recent change patrollers to revert it. Sneaky vandalism from sleeper accounts is problematic, though. Take Misplaced Pages:Sockpuppet investigations/Никита-Родин-2002, for example, which was the subject of that ANI discussion. Nikita's modus operandi is to change the certifications/charts of the songs and albums of certain bands, usually to make Green Day or The Who appear more accomplished than they actually are. In recent changes, those edits look like this or this or this. Our typical vandalism detection tools will never identify those edits as vandalism and our recent change patrollers will appropriately assume good faith if not familiar with the long-term abuse. We need a more effective tool for keeping the encyclopedia accurate in these extremely rare situations, and that tool is 30/500. I can't think of any other situation in which I would support the use of 30/500 outside of ArbCom approval.

Additional questions from Esquivalience

6. Have you edited under any accounts or IPs before? If so, for how long?

A: I've never made any substantive edits under another account or an IP prior to this account. It's possible that I fixed a typo here or there years prior to making this account, and I may have even registered an account to do so. I didn't remember any past username when registering and was unable to recover any username when I attempted to double-check if I had an account associated with previous email addresses. I have no previous familiarity with the MediaWiki software.

7. In your own words, explain consensus and outline the differences between consensus-based decision making versus voting-based decision making.

A: Consensus is the rough agreement produced through a discussion focusing on which solution to a dispute most improves the encyclopedia. The key difference between consensus and voting-based decision making is that consensus is not blind to the rationales of why editors are supporting a particular solution whereas a vote relies only on the number of editors supporting each solution. When determining consensus, strength of arguments is crucial. If Editor A explains that he supports Solution A because of specific relevant policies and guidelines, his arguments are stronger than an Editor B who provides no rationale at all or provides a rationale that clearly contradicts policies or guidelines. Editor A would also have a stronger argument if he convinced many editors that the policies and guidelines he cited were relevant and supportive of his position whereas Editor B failed to convince anyone that his argument was based in policy. A consensus results when one position has stronger arguments based on both the policies or guidelines and how well the arguments persuaded other editors.

Additional question from Ritchie333

8. When you requested opinions at the candidate poll, a concern was raised over events documented at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Women/Archive 7#Women in fiction, where a categorisation bot you had a hand in appeared to be running at an over-broad scope. Can you briefly summarise the incident described there, what the problem was, and how we can be assured that no disruption is likely to take place in the future?

A: Automated WikiProject tagging can be a great method of increasing the number of tagged pages for a project without occupying content creators with maintenance tasks, but it comes with its fair share of downsides. The biggest downside is that many category trees on the project are horrendously broken. As an example, if WP:WikiProject Philosophy tagged everything in the category tree of Category:Philosophy, they'd be unpleasantly surprised to find that they'd tagged the full contents of Category:Women thriller writers along with it. The solution to this has been User:Yobot#WikiProject_tagging, which sets forth a series of best practices for automated tagging. In particular, anyone requesting project tagging from a bot operator is required to show consensus for the tagging on the project's talk page including a full list of all categories to be tagged (including all sub-categories, if you want those tagged). Project participants are expected to check each listed category to ensure the pages should be tagged. All of these steps were followed in this particular bot run, but they still fell short.

At Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Women/Archive 7#Women in fiction, you can see the discussion that lasted on the project's talk page for over two weeks which received no significant opposition. It became evident after the run was completed that the categories provided by members of the project contained articles which shouldn't have been tagged. I've since added a step to the best practices mentioned above where I spot check each category listed to ensure nothing pops out as obviously incorrect. This doesn't guarantee that a tagging run will never go awry, however. Project participants know the scope of their projects far better than a random bot operator. I've provided a technical method to automatically tag articles when the project shows consensus to do so, but it's up to individual WikiProjects to decide what they wish to have tagged. Technically speaking, the bot did exactly what it was meant to; a project fed in a list of categories to tag and the bot tagged them. My new operating procedures will catch any blatantly incorrect tagging, but it's no substitute for project participants reviewing the categories that they're requesting automated tagging for.

Additional question from FabledGold

9. First attempt at a RFA. What will be your legacy to Misplaced Pages?

A: That's hard to say. I certainly hope it's as a net positive editor who helped maintain and expand the largest free repository of knowledge in the world, but beyond that, I'm not really going for legacy. Most of the work I do isn't glamorous. It's necessary back-end work essential to the day-to-day operation of the encyclopedia, but few people pay attention to the sort of things I work on unless something goes horribly wrong. Maybe the legacy I should be shooting for is to be forgotten, since that would indicate everything went smoothly.

I think this is a stupid question that tells you nothing about whether or not the candidate is suitable to be an administrator. Ritchie333 19:16, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

FabledGold (talk · contribs · count) is a  Confirmed sock puppet of Winterysteppe (talk · contribs · count).--Bbb23 (talk) 19:35, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Optional questions from Pharaoh of the Wizards

10. A user nominates a Template Corruption in India used in over 50 articles for deletion and the nominator is the only user to comment ,a Non Admin closes as delete and marks it for Speedy deletion. But an admin declines to delete it stating Speedy Declined seems to be heavily linked to, consensus is weak .If you are closer ,which closure will you endorse and why ?

A: I would close that as "no consensus". I'm generally in favor of soft deleting templates when the TfD goes unopposed and I cannot anticipate any opposition based on precedent at TfD. For example, see the several public domain templates which I closed as soft delete at Misplaced Pages:Templates for discussion/Log/2016 June 23; templates which are unused and templates which are wholly redundant are routinely deleted at TfD, so soft deletion of templates which are both unused and redundant is appropriate. On the other hand, I think more clear consensus than "no opposition" is necessary when dealing with templates where reasonable opposition could be expected. This is true even if I wouldn't personally agree with that reasonable opposition. The opening line of the nomination you provided already takes soft deletion off the table for me. "You might wonder at this nomination, because it seems at first to be an entirely reasonable topic" shows that even the nominator agrees that reasonable opposition could be expressed.

11. Would you as a Non Admin have closed it ?

A: Yes, I would. If a non-admin shows competence, I'm in favor of them closing any discussion so long as they have the technical tools to implement the next step after closure. Adminship is a set of technical tools, not a leadership position.

Optional question from Wehwalt

12. Would you address the question of this diff raised in Neutral #1? What are your thoughts on the matter, as it regards political correctness?

A: It depends how you define political correctness. If we define political correctness along the lines of "avoiding offensive speech or actions to the point where the speech or actions aren't effective", then I'm against political correctness. If we instead define political correctness as "avoiding offensive speech or actions where the objectionable aspect doesn't help achieve the purpose of the speech or actions", then I'm strongly for political correctness. In this case, I don't think we need an allegory to suicide to convey the idea that we should give second chances to see if blocked users are really a net positive. The previous sentence more-or-less proves my point: "Give second chances to see if blocked users are really a net positive" is essentially a thirteen-word summary of WP:ROPE that no-one would find objectionable. The spirit of WP:GRATUITOUS would seem to apply here; use the least objectionable language that gets your point across effectively.

Additional question from Northamerica1000

13. In your answer to question #1 you stated not being interested in regularly contributing to AfD in an administrative capacity or in performing speedy deletions. If these areas were to become signficantly backlogged, would you reconsider this stance?

A: Probably, but it depends. WP:UAA and WP:ANI are two places I'd be unlikely to help out with regardless of backlogs, at least in the near future. UAA is an area I know little to nothing about, and my typical process of reading, a bit of trial and error, and then asking for feedback would absolutely not be applicable to the block button. I'd need a mentor or something to get into that area. ANI is too dramatic for my tastes. I could see myself helping out with backlogs at WP:AN3 or WP:AIV, which are both fairly simple. Backlogs cause active damage to the encyclopedia at those areas, so I couldn't really look at backlogs there and do nothing.

As for WP:AfD and WP:CSD, I'd be willing to help out on backlogs there as a last resort, but I doubt it will ever come up. CSD is almost never backlogged in the criteria that "count" (WP:G10, WP:G11, etc). I'm not too concerned if an WP:A7 tag sits there for a couple days. The only consistently backlogged criteria is WP:G6, and that's my fault from TfD and CfD. As for AfD, I might help as a last resort, but I would sooner push for experienced non-admins to be able to close discussions as delete. It's a solution that has worked in every process where it's been tried, it helps break down the wall between admins and non-admins, and it's one way to deal with the overall shortage of administrators.

Additional question from Ottawahitech

14. Do you agree with your nominator (User:Good Olfactory) that it is unnecessary to inform creators of categories when their creation is nominated for deletion?

A: It depends. I believe it's necessary to inform the creator of the category when feasible. If it's a one-category nomination, then notification is practically mandatory. If it's a 500-category nomination, then I can't justify the work of going through 500 categories and individually notifying each creator, not to mention the pseudo-canvassing this would cause. As for notifying WikiProjects, which has been more controversial at CfD lately, I do not consider WikiProject notifications necessary. It's up to WikiProjects to tag their categories. Nominators cannot be required to be familiar with all of the hundreds of active projects if they don't tag their content. Once WikiProjects tag their content, it's a very quick process to set up WP:AALERTS, which will ensure the project is never caught off-guard by an XfD of their tagged content. Given how simple it is for the WikiProject to receive automated alerts of XfDs related to their tagged content, I place the onus on them, not the nominator, to handle notifications.

Having said that, it would be unhelpful to just tell WikiProjects that they should go tag thousands of categories manually. I'm more than happy to help projects do such tagging with my bot, as I recently offered the stub sorting project.

Additional question from Carrite

15. Above you were asked by User:Esquivalience "Have you edited under any accounts or IPs before? If so, for how long?" and you answered "I've never made any substantive edits under another account or an IP prior to this account. It's possible that I fixed a typo here or there years prior to making this account, and I may have even registered an account to do so.... I have no previous familiarity with the MediaWiki software." Yet when we examine your VERY FIRST EDIT to Misplaced Pages, we find that you opined on a Templates for Discussion page HERE and that you managed to rack up well over 500 edits in your first week of editing at WP, never having edited WP before and having "no previous familiarity with the MediaWiki software." My question for you is this: do you wish to amend your answer number 6 above? And a follow-up: if you do not choose to change your answer, how do you explain a first edit to such an arcane area of Misplaced Pages and such obvious familiarity with MediaWiki software during your first week of editing???

A: My answer to question 4 explains my best recollection of how I came across that TfD. I saw a deletion notice in an article and disagreed with it enough to register an account and participate in the discussion. As for my high activity, I'll quote my explanation from the BRFA where I was questioned on my past activity: "I'm a college student on his first true vacation in the last three years. I'm used to being busy, and I've been bored not having much to do over the summer. I acquired my knowledge by reading policies and guidelines and making copious amounts of mistakes, as you'll be able to see in my talk page archive and in the history (from before I created an archive)." Most of my edits in the first week were vandalism revision, which is the area I felt most capable of starting out in. Counter-vandalism is edit-heavy work where the edits add up quickly. I forget the name of the tool I used for counter-vandalism, but I remember it being a list of all IP recent changes where the IPs popped up on a map. As for whether I lied in question 6, I did not; I've never substantively edited as an IP or using other accounts, with the exception of my bot.

Discussion

• Links for BU Rob13: BU Rob13 (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
• Edit summary usage for BU Rob13 can be found here.

Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review their contributions before commenting.

Support

1. Support Will be a net positive. ThePlatypusofDoom (Talk) 01:02, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
2. Support. Fully qualified candidate. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:04, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
3. Support. It's raining admins! I had a look around BU Rob's contribs recently and found a level-headed, knowledgeable Wikipedian. - Dank (push to talk) 01:05, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
4. Support Incredible work at CFD and TFD. I remember that the backlogs there used to be huge, but since Rob has started working there they've gone down considerably. He's also got some good content to his name, which is a big plus. Him becoming an admin would be help for admins who regularly clean out G6s, as they wouldn't have to delete the pages after he closes TFD debates, he would be able to delete them himself. Omni Flames (talk) 01:07, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
5. Strong Support. I stumbled across one of Rob's early contributions, Bryan Burnham, and noticed an excellent creation that was just a little short of the size requirements of DYK. I added a couple sentences to it and nominated it for DYK; and since the editor was really only a newbie, didn't think anything of it. Next thing I know, he's cranking out DYK credits like it's nothing, he's already got ~40 of them! Outside of content creation, I've seen him all over the place, and every time I see him in discussions, I see nothing but intelligent, level-headed contributions. Rob is here for the right reasons and it'd be a great service for Misplaced Pages to vet him with the mop. -- Tavix 01:15, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
6. Support – Great to see a candidate who has vast experience in some of the lesser-known and lesser-worked-in parts of the WP universe. United States Man (talk) 01:20, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
7. (edit conflict × 2) Support per Omni Flames's point about admins who clean out G6, as well not being too proud to retract the AfD on Carnism (see Q3). Also, Rob was a great example of how to participate in discussions in the Village Pump discussion that preceded the present April Fool's RfC. Chickadee46 (talk|contribs) (WP:MCW) 01:21, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
8. Support. I have looked through BU Rob's work and I'm very impressed. We need more administrators willing to work on backlogs and the more mundane side of adminship. Rob has clearly built up good faith with the community, doesn't get into disputes, and has earned his right to "the tools". It'll be a travesty if he's nitpicked into failure by the process because this is the sort of person we need. KaisaL (talk) 01:22, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
9. Support For sure, I have been looking forward to this RfA. I find the assumption of bad faith by Stemoc to be repugnant and in no way compelling. HighInBC 01:34, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
10. Support, per my interactions with him at BRFA and elsewhere. A great contributor and obviously a net positive. Enterprisey (talk!) _{(formerly APerson)} 01:38, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
11. (edit conflict) Support - A no-brainer. Backlog-clearing is truly unglamorous, yeoman's work, but it's important work that has to get done, nonetheless. Rob has a solid track-record of thoughtful, civil contributions to discussions. I'm very heartened to see the diff cited above - there's no shame in changing your mind. In addition, they've been singularly helpful in dealing with the notorious LTA Никита-Родин-2002: They started an ANI thread that authorized 30/500 protection, and have contributed a large percentage of the reports to the SPI. Good luck, GAB 01:39, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
12. Support Easy choice for admin. Will use the tools well! « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 01:59, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
13. Support – TfD and CfD could definitely gain from a dedicated Admin, and I've never seen Rob have a bad interaction with anyone. Plus, he's done good work around the project. --IJBall (contribs • talk) 02:02, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
14. Support -FASTILY 02:16, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
15. Absolutely - Seen you around, absolutely would trust with the tools. SQL 02:22, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
16. Support From looking at his contributions and his experience, I strongly would trust him with the tools. MrWooHoo (T • C) 02:24, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
17. Very strong support I participated in the long and frustrating dispute at carnism, and found that Rob was always a fair-minded voice of sanity and policy (including when disagreeing with me): . I quickly came to admire his temperament and clue. Since then, I've seen his work around WP and always found the same thoughtful, well-informed, and patient contributions. He would be a wonderful admin. FourViolas (talk) 03:28, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
18. Support, based on review. Kierzek (talk) 03:29, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
19. Support. Net positive. He knows what he's doing. Anarchyte (work | talk) 03:37, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
20. Support, clearly a levelheaded editor who is an unambiguous net positive. The only concern I might have is his quickness to go to arbcom over the nikita socks, but this is relatively minor. Happy to support.Tazerdadog (talk) 04:05, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
21. Support - Barring evidence to the contrary, I am willing to trust that Rob has nothing but the best of intentions and will do well as an administrator. Kurtis 04:32, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
22. Support Meets my personal checklist, answer to #4 is quite acceptable. A burst of enthusiasm is to be expected, and while the learning curve here is steep, it can be negotiated in different ways.--Wehwalt (talk) 05:49, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
23. Support -- I can't say whether or not my own bad behavior has sponsored, in whatever capacity, the sourness and suspicion that is currently in the Oppose section and that is almost certainly to come to this RfA. Whatever the case, this candidate is qualified and willing. Even if he has had past accounts, I'm hesitant to say that a more than stellar track record in this name does not compensate. BU Rob13, I wish you well. Don't let the suspicion get to you. --ceradon 06:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
24. Support per Special:Diff/726784329. SSTflyer 07:37, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
25. Support. By my investigation, Rob is an editor with obvious clue, the right temperament, and a proven track record in both content creation and nontrivial maintenance work. His answers to the RfA questions are spot on. (I was particularly pleased with his helpful links, for example, his links in question 2 which cite non-admins' authority to close CfD and TfD discussions: it's a small detail many editors, myself included, would have overlooked.) The suggestion that his history is too good to be true is akin to Russell's teapot: all steam and no substance. If his history is unusual, it is only because his intelligence and assiduousness are unusual. Rebbing 07:40, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
26. Support: having looked through some of Rob's previous contributions at XfD and on talk pages, he seems to be very clueful. I am especially pleased with his willingness to judge consensus on the basis of the arguments given rather than simply looking at numerical weight – something which, though it is policy, is not always followed. As for the single oppose rationale that Rob was suspiciously competent as a beginner: well, if it turns out that he has spent a year of his life and 46k productive edits solely to become a rogue admin, then he can be blocked and dysysopped, but I judge the likelyhood of that actually being the case as vanishingly small. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 08:02, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
27. Support, obvious. Graham87 08:30, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
28. Support – Having looked through his edit history, Rob is definitely suitable for adminship. I do not foresee him misusing the tools. Z105space (talk) 08:42, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
29. Support, precious, and with clue, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:56, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
30. Support Of course! A suitable candidate for adminship. Good luck Bu Rob13! — Hamid Hassani (talk) 09:15, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
31. Support Absolutely. Mop wisely. :-) Katie 09:16, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
32. Support - no concerns. GiantSnowman 09:23, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
33. Support as nom, of course. Let's add to what I said above that this is the second time he's responded gracefully to unwarranted suspicions of bad faith, which is a very good skill to have as a newly initiated cabal member I mean, a new admin ;) Opabinia regalis (talk) 09:27, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
34. Support I have run across Rob at least once when he advised me during a silly argument I had immersed myself in with two respected and quite experienced administrators. His two statement advise was perhaps more insightful than the miles of conversations made previously. I respect him for that interaction and much more. He is a mature editor with a great amount of good quality work done for this encyclopaedia. Hell, if this is how banned editors are, then we should be getting more (pun intended of course). We need to introspect and consider the time Rob has spent here, the effort taken on writing and improving multiple articles, the investment he has done in resolving multiple issues...and all the while being a student. I applaud this kind of voluntary work and am sure my fellow editors too do so. Go and just do the work Rob (you know what I'm talking about). And enjoy your time here. Lourdes 10:53, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
35. Support. Seems to know what he's doing. Edit count and how fast he accumulated them shouldn't be an indication of whether or not he's likely to misuse the tools. I didn't uncover anything in his history (and neither has anyone else) to suggest he will. ERK 11:00, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
36. Support. As someone on the talk page said, "Sometimes, something that is too good to be true, really is true". Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:06, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

    :D :D Lourdes 11:16, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

37. Support, great work overall, will be particularly useful at TfD, CfD. Nsk92 (talk) 11:51, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
38. Support Frankly, when TfD gets so backlogged that non-admins are cleared to close discussions as delete, anyone wanting to use a mop and bucket in that area should be welcomed with open arms. No other concerns, good and thorough answer to Q8 which clearly illustrates that he knows his stuff. Ritchie333 11:53, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
39. Support per my comments at the Optional RfA candidate poll - In short perfect candidate. –Davey2010 12:34, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
40. Support Not only is this user qualified to be an admin, but also I see no reason to oppose. (Frankly, I found the oppose arguments to be unfounded. Just because someone knows his/her way around Misplaced Pages doesn't mean that he or she is using a sock puppet account.) Joshualouie711 (talk) 13:12, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
41. Support, do not see any issues, and we definitely need more manpower at CfD and TfD--Ymblanter (talk) 13:24, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
42. Good egg, seems like he's here for the right reasons, has experience in the areas he wants to work. I've been impressed in my interactions with him. Only word of advice, would be to watch out for burnout as he seems a likely candidate – sometimes the best thing you can do is to take a break and come back refreshed. Jenks24 (talk) 13:26, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
43. Support. Only decision, as a non-admin closer, by the candidate that I've had concerns about where resolved by the candidate very rapidly (and with more calm than would have been expected, since I was talking about having the close overturned). Pays attention, has the kind of experience needed, and doesn't ruffle easily (or ruffle others) from what I can tell.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ≼  13:36, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
44. Support – I have encountered this user here and there and he always seems to behave well. Suggest he modify the way his signature is rendered because otherwise, when you use the search box at WP:ANI, you get many unrelated hits for 'Rob'. Consider changing your visible signature to 'Rob13'. EdJohnston (talk) 15:29, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
45. Support. It would be very hard to oppose a candidate nominated by someone as thorough as Opabinia and her co-nominator, but I had to be sure and do my own research. All I came across were some oppose below that seems to be determined to maintain RfA as a horrible and broken process. An ideal, mature, highly qualified model candidate, we need more like BU Rob13 - if we can get RfA finally cleaned up.Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:39, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
46. Support. Will make a good admin, I hope. Qweedsa (talk) 15:51, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
47. Encountered Rob around TfD. Has created decent content. Rob seems very eager to work in backlogs, and this project needs more participants willing to handle these administrative tasks. Seems to be a fast learner as well, picking up TPROT requests recently and handling them well. He's undoubtedly been a big net positive in his year-or-so tenure. Support — Andy W. (talk · ctb) 16:09, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
48. Support haven't managed to take as thorough a review of this editor as I would normally, but a quick flick through suggests they are a net positive to the project, and a good candidate for adminship. Go for it -- samtar 16:19, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
49. For the sake of conciseness, I'll say "per all of the above." Kylo, Rey, & Finn Consortium, now featuring BB-8 (talk) 16:58, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
50. Support as he has done some excellent work for Misplaced Pages as a non-admin and I believe these will be further accelerated through adminship. The first Oppose is a complete violation of AGF which needs looking into. --PatientZero 17:06, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
51. Support They seem polite and friendly and you really can never have too many level-headed, fast-learning admins willing to clear unglamourous backlogs. Students make a full time occupation of learning things quickly and very well by reading them. I have also found Misplaced Pages to be quite easy to learn, though I tend to be cautious anyway. After seeing the mess and heartbreak that a new user acting with good faith and no competence can cause, I wish we could stop automatically suspecting new competent account. We want new users to read a few policies before editing, if possible. Happy Squirrel (talk) 17:54, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
52. Strong support from the first time I interacted with Rob after a TfD closure I wondered how he wasn't already an admin. I have no reservations. Wugapodes 18:03, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
53. Support - CAPTAIN RAJU 18:22, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
54. Makes mistakes, but everybody makes mistakes. The important thing in the context of Misplaced Pages is a willingness to admit mistakes, coupled with an understanding of which fields one's not competent to act in, and I can't see any obvious issues here. @Stemoc, what does it matter even if he turns out not to be a new user? I can think of at most five examples in the entire history of Misplaced Pages of people getting a sock through RFA, and not a single one of those socks actually caused any problems; if some hypothetical Bad User wanted sysop access that badly, there are considerably easier ways to get hold of an admin account than working for a year at creating a false identity. ‑ Iridescent 18:33, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

    Robdurbar (context) was at least briefly problematic, thought that was a long time ago. Wifione (context) was much worse and much more recent. —Cryptic 00:27, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

55. Support: Will be a great help with closing TfDs because then he can delete those templates. —MRD2014 T C 18:50, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
56. Support Very helpful. Will be a net positive. Fouetté rond de jambe en tournant 19:53, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
57. Support, assuming good faith; the candidate is well recommended and does seem to have plenty of clue. Editors oppose RFAs for too few edits, and then turn around and say another candidate has too many. Sheesh. Miniapolis 20:07, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
58. Support So what if hes been here just over a year, and has 46k edits in that time span? User seems mature and probably wouldn't abuse the tools, given the amount of effort they've put into the wikipedia. Guthix no more (talk) 20:31, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
59. Support From what I've seen of him, he's plenty competent, and he seems eager to help in areas that have been short on admins lately. TheCatalyst31 21:03, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
60. Support likely to be net positive. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:31, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
61. Support. Clean record, good contributions, likely to be more of an asset to the project as an administrator. --Coemgenus (talk) 22:42, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
62. Support you have my full support Rob! Came across your work at TfD and you are a tireless contributor to the project who is well deserving of admin tools. st170e 00:29, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
63. Support - On review, I'm convinced Rob will make a fine admin.- MrX 00:46, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
64. Support - no reason not to. Banedon (talk) 02:29, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
65. Support but keep up very good content creation Atlantic306 (talk) 03:31, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

    I'm unfortunately on a forced content creation vacation because my undergraduate institution has yanked my library database access, but I plan to jump right back in when Penn sets up my library account. ~ Rob₁₃ 03:43, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

66. Support I'm also impressed with the candidate's content creation and level-headed-ness. This, having a clue, strong nominations, and the the backlog clearing makes the candidate easy for me to support. - tucoxn\ 04:33, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
67. We've interacted a lot through bot approvals. Rob is careful and sensible, and from his record I can't imagine him having anything but the best of intentions here, and we've seen the quality of work he can produce. There's some concern in the oppose section about account age, but really, we've had plenty of greener admins who have done just fine. — Earwig  07:00, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
68. Support - A year is long enough to learn the ropes. I don't see a temperment that I think would lend itself to wielding the admin status like a badge to sway arguments either. James086 07:26, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
69. Support We need more admins, see no reason to think he'd abuse the position. PeterTheFourth (talk) 10:24, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
70. Support I was going to !vote oppose as per Semtoc's point below, which was a phenomonally perceptive one; but BU_Rob's answer to Q4 is comprehensive enough to distill any doubts as to this candidate. _Muffled 11:23, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
71. Support Oripaypaykim (talk) 11:31, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
72. Support First bumped in to BU Rob at TfD and impressed by his workrate. The favourable impression has been continually enhanced by encountering his contributions elsewhere, particularly at CfD and closing an RfC I'd raised. Given that he's used the AWB and TE tools so effectively we can only look forward to what BU Rob will achieve with the mop. Wholehearted enthusiastic support, for (;;) (talk) 11:53, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
73. Support (edit conflict)- Good candidate, should be trusted with the tools. Class455fan1 (talk) 11:56, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
74. Support Clear net positive and on a sidenote good to see a editor who started to edit in 2015 became an admin is the 8th admin since 2012 and within the 30 admins who started to edit since 2010 per this.Pharaoh of the Wizards (talk) 12:50, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
75. Support I've no issues trusting BU Rob, I've seen them around the place and haven't had a problem with anything they've done. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 13:56, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
76. Support. I find this user's answers compelling and their reasoning carefully considered in general. They clearly have a level head on their shoulders and have a definite use for the administrative toolkit in the areas outlined in Q1. /wiae /tlk 14:26, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
77. Support based on the candidate's general cluefulness and our AIV/SPI related interactions. Widr (talk) 14:37, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
78. Refreshing to see a good candidate who hasn't been here for years already. —Kusma (t·c) 15:18, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

    Yeah, I do like a newbie who can jump right into Templates for Discussion on Day 1, as well. There aren't enough of those... Carrite (talk) 17:06, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

Oppose

1. 46k edits in just over a year..I'm sorry but I do not believe that a new user can collect that much in that short a time. Your first few edits seems like the edits of someone who knows how to use wikipedia, so if this is your 2nd account, please mention your first account. There was a time when editors who were on the wiki for less than 6 months could become admins but I think that time has passed...Its hard to support a "new user" who knows the wiki like the back of their hand without accepting the fact that they could very well be 'banned' socks.. (has happened before)..your account is too good to be true..sorry--Stemoc 01:43, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   Discussion moved to talk page.—_Chat:Offline 05:44, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

2. I don't think Rob is ready quiet yet. While he makes good edits and his DYK track record is impressive, he has only been a member here for a year, with a four-month period of low activity in there too, making his high edit count kind of suspicious. He has made 46,000 edits in eight months of active editing, and half of them are automated. I don't think that eight months (or even a year) is long enough to be able to familiarise oneself with all the policies quite yet, so I think that if Rob were to keep this up for another year or two, I would not hesitate to support. YITYNR 15:17, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   Well, this is an example of WP:NOTQUITEYET abuse. We used to have admins appointed in their 6th month of editing, and we had a good amount of rules. ThePlatypusofDoom (Talk) 17:40, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   I became an admin after 9 months. Good enough to make a baby, good enough to make an admin. I do however concede that it was a long time ago(almost 10 years) and that standards of drifted. Of all the desysops I have seen I don't think I have ever seen one due to lack of experience on Misplaced Pages. It almost always comes down to temperament. HighInBC 17:49, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   "Good enough to make a baby, good enough to make an admin". I just love that quote. Omni Flames (talk) 22:46, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   Hold on, are you saying that admins are babies?! That's awful. GAB 00:06, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   No, I am saying I was a baby when I became an admin, now I am almost 10! HighInBC 00:09, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   Whereas I'm passed 10 in Wikilife, but still a baby admin. Takes all sorts to make the world go round :)  — Amakuru (talk) 13:49, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   You guys are nuts :D If only everyone could have this attitude while editing around here... Lourdes 01:35, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   If this were the Misplaced Pages of 2003 where people became admins after a few months, I would be inclined to support. However, the standards have drifted so high above that that this argument now holds very little water. Most users are looking for at least one to two, if not several, years of active editing, and besides, users with more experience than Rob, such as Cyberpower678, have been nominated unsuccessfully. I consider myself to be a fairly experienced editor, having joined in October 2014 (well before Rob) and been active for the past year or so, meaning that I check Misplaced Pages twice per day and spend time at Special:AbuseLog reverting vandalism at least one of those times. I am well-versed in anti-vandalism procedures and have also created an article, in addition to having made WP:AIV and WP:UAA reports and commented in 2 XfD's, and yet I very strongly doubt I would become an admin, even with twenty months of experience. YITYNR 10:58, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   My RfA should in no way be used as a criteria for opposing someone newer than me. My RfA failed for other reasons, not a lack of experience. Every one is different, and even though, he is much newer than, I have no problem facing the fact the Rob may well be a better admin than I can be. I am however not saying that I would make a terrible admin, or even a remotely bad one at that.—_{Chat:Limited Access} 11:18, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   I disagree with the assertion that the standards have drifted so high that most people want 1 or 2 years from a candidate. This very RfA demonstrates that most people will support the person if they demonstrate the skills and temperament needed. I respect the argument, but the support here shows it is not the majority position. HighInBC 14:12, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

3. Oppose -- This editor is still wet behind the ears and needs some more experience. I also feel as if they don't appreciate other editor's opinions during content disputes, such as on Catherine Zeta-Jones. It's their way or nothing. Not good. Cassianto 18:40, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   I actually see the candidate as being quite respectful in that discussion -- even when another editor may have become somewhat insulting. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 16:18, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   It does seem that their comments were reasonable. I do see some "It's their way or nothing" attitude going on there, but not from Rob. May I ask what specifically you object to because I don't see it? HighInBC 16:23, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   I don't discuss my votes, so I suggest you both move on. Cassianto 16:45, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   I only asked to better understand your position. You were very vague, if you don't care to point out what you actually object to then that is fine. HighInBC 16:48, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   It's not difficult to understand. How can you find a link to a conversation and a comment saying "they don't appreciate other editors points of view" "vague"? I don't discuss the wheres and whyfores of my votes for the same reasons as why I'm not allowed ask those who support to elaborate, as per previous RfAs. Cassianto 17:02, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

4. Oppose - Only nine (9) active months at Misplaced Pages and these frequently marked by an astronomical edit count typical of automation. Sorry, insufficient tenure for a lifetime appointment as an administrator. Way, way, way, way too much danger that accounts showing such a track record are alternate accounts of another editor. Carrite (talk) 14:50, 3 July 2016 (UTC)
5. Oppose Barely 9 months of active editing and " Whenever I go to any article, I read the infobox first for the key details. A good portion of the time, that gives me the information I wanted." which suggests he has little respect for the opinion of others and what he wants takes precedence. If he can't respect the view of the article writer and when to butt out on something like that he's hardly going to make a good, neutral admin is he? Absolutely not. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 16:46, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

Neutral

#Neutral I think highly of the content edits, but I am concerned by the oppose. So many edits in the first 20 days is atypical, and it is a fair concern. I'd rather the concern had not been met with so much argument as to the propriety of the question, which has actually led me to post as a neutral rather than just awaiting developments. We have had admins who had histories they did not disclose, this is part of the vetting process whereby we try to prevent that. Kurtis's point that we can always pull the plug is well taken, but that sort of route sometimes involves collateral damage. Awaiting answer to #4, though I would rather it had omitted the commentary.--Wehwalt (talk) 05:35, 2 July 2016 (UTC) Moving to support.--Wehwalt (talk) 05:49, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

1. Neutral - After a quick review of our interactions, I often disagree with this user in discussions. I'm not going to oppose because of that, as a diversity of opinions is beneficial to the encyclopedia. However, I found one opinion particularly disagreeable "In response to all the editors stating no-one exists who this would offend: My uncle hung himself. Tell me with a straight face that I should be expected to make references to giving people rope to hang themselves when I talk about second chances. The offensive content here serves no purpose. And it is offensive." Firstly, taking such a personal position isn't usually a good idea. I have strong personal beliefs, but I always try to set them aside and look at things objectively. Secondly, I'm strongly against unruly censorship to avoid offense, especially in essays. As a another user in the same discussion said "... Let's all be frank: that this is a political correctness debate. ...".—Godsy_CONT) 17:18, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   Happened almost a year ago. The user has matured quite a bit since then. Lourdes 17:29, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

   Are we supposed to be relieved that this user was immature a year ago but is more mature now? Carrite (talk) 14:53, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

   Carrite, you know the answer yourself. In the same manner that I can unabashedly say that I adore your contributions and effort to improve Misplaced Pages (you know that already), I can say that not everyone, including Rob (and least of all editors like me), understands Misplaced Pages and its culture as good as experienced editors like you or Wehwalt or Brian do. New editors through their various experiences try to learn how to interact with other editors. If you trawl my contributions (even just a month ago), I've managed to make a fool of myself and quite easily. It was a lesson for me which hopefully improved me. I am confident that Rob too has had these experiences and has become a better communicator than he was during those days. Rest, I will leave to your judgement, because whatever you do decide, I'm very confident that would be a right judgement. Lourdes 16:57, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

General comments