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Geni

Voice your opinion (talk page) (23/16/5); Scheduled to end 10:23, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Geni (talk · contribs) - I've been around on wikipedia since March 2004 so I know my way around fairly well. During that time I've done just about everything possible on wikipedia at some time or another (and technically at least one thing that is now impossible). I have a little over 21K edits on my main account and 5K edits on Genisock2. Recently I have been concentrating on copyright issues, adding images and adding book refs. I have been an admin before. I was de-admined as part of an arbcom decision but I would argue that over the last year and 5 months both the project and myself have changed somewhat to the extent that he conditions that caused the problem are unlikely to reoccur. I've been an admin on commons since sept 07 and that doesn't appear to have caused any problems. I have access to the OTRS permissions queue (and related) again no complaints so far.


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: Bit of everything although with a focus on stuff related to copyright and images.
2. What are your best contributions to Misplaced Pages, and why?
A: Referenced info, images and videos (not many videos yes though) added to a fair number of articles. I rarely write complete articles and more normally add info to existing articles. I've improved a wide range of canal articles in this way (in addition to writing a number from scratch)
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've been involved in a fair number of conflicts. Ideally stop, debate, try to find common ground try and bring in outsiders or people to view the problem from a different angle. Or sometimes just walk away.

Optional question from Cyclonenim (talk · contribs)

4. Why do you think you require the tools on the en-wiki? Your statement and answer to questions seems a little vague on that area.
A:No one requires admin tools (with the exception some foundation people). Do you mean why would I find that admin tools useful? The usual being able to sort copyright and mediawiki namespace stuff myself without having to find admins to tell me about deleted images and the like. Or do you mean how would it be useful for wikipedia to have me with admin tools? Well I can do just about anything that doesn't involve direct use of javescript or CSS. I still tend to appear towards the top of active admin lists. I know my way around both wikipedia and mediawiki to a greater extent than average and I know copyright quite well.Geni 11:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Entirely optional question from Anonymous Dissident (talk · contribs)

5. You state that you have changed somewhat since last year's incident, but provide no further elaboration. Further expansion as to how you've changed, your current views on the issue in its entirety and your part in that, and as to why exactly the community can trustfully see fit to re-grant the tools would be much appreciated. —Anonymous Dissident
A:I'm more prepared to let things go. Could you clarify which issue you are asking about? As for trust well I haven't put the goatse on the main page lately (strangely I didn't make a change to the main page until after I ceased to be an en admin). The various policy debates I've been involved in have had lower levels of conflict. I also have more experence so am less likely to be winging things in future.Geni 13:11, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Optional question from Dweller (talk · contribs)

6. Have you been significantly involved in anything a reasonable person might construe as "controversial" on this site in, say, the last year?
A:Yes. Apart from anything else I was involved in some recent changes to BLP. The Giovanni di Stefano thing. Rainbow Family (see the talk page) various others. Copyright also puts me on the edge of conflicts from time to time. I'm involved in a lot of policy and meta debates. Controversy is unavoidable.Geni 13:48, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Optional question from the wub (talk · contribs)

7. The arbcom decision states that you "may reapply for adminship privileges at any time or may appeal to this Committee for reinstatement". Have you applied to the ArbCom directly since that decision, and if so could you provide a link to their response?
A: I have never applied to arbcom dirrectly no.Geni 13:49, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Optional question from Winger84

8. Do you believe that it is possible for a user that has been blocked for reasons other than 3RR - making an allowance for the fact that it is possible for two or more editors to experience moments of extreme stubbornness, believing that their edit(s) is/are correct - to ever be completely trusted again? Or, do you believe in the line of thinking, "Once blocked, always watched?" If you believe that it is possible for complete trust to be regained, what is a "reasonable threshold" of time - whether it be specifically time or a number of successful edits - for that trust to be regained? What about a user that has previously been banned but perhaps was able to convince administrators to reinstate their account?
I do not consider the concept of complete trust to be useful outside certain forms of committed meat space relationships. Are there users who have been blocked that I would be prepared to trust as admins in future? Yes. Standards for doing so? This is something best done on a case basis.Geni 18:38, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
9. If this RfA is successful, do you intend to add yourself to CAT:AOR?
No I do not consider it to be effective at achieving its objectives. Recent events suggest that I am correct in this judgement. I consider arbcom's fairly active stance on de-admining to be effective for the time being.Geni 18:38, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Optional question from Protonk (talk)

10. Why, in your own words, were you desysoped? Protonk (talk) 18:32, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
As phrased that question is impossible to answer or at impossible until we manage to read Jimbo's mind and/or get a really big arbcom-l leak. At least if you want to get beyond the trite "because arbcom has decided that my behaviour was unacceptable for an admin". Perhaps the closest I can answer is "why do I think I should have been desyoped?".
The most obvious one is that leaving me as an admin would carry too high a risk of letting me think that because I got away with it that time I would be able to do so in future. Short term admin suspension also carried the same risk.
Then there is the issue of wider example. We seen what impact letting admins get away with things has on the wider admin and editor community. It isn’t good.Geni 19:13, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
I'll try to phrase this another way:
  • The rationale given for your desysoping by Jimbo (and extension by the Arbcom) noted a history of inappropriate use of the tools. Do you think this was an accurate characterization? Protonk (talk) 19:27, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  • For a given values of those terms yes. There were a couple of previous cases where I had steped over the line a couple where later changes meant I had done so and few where I came very close to doing so.Geni 19:48, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

General comments

RfAs for this user:

Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review Special:Contributions/Geni before commenting.

Discussion

  • If you lost your mob through ArbCom, I'd like to request the link to the related ArbCom discussion. Someone will post it sooner or later anyway, so I think you should go ahead and post it before they do, as a sign that you have nothing to hide maybe. Regards SoWhy 10:47, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
It's two clicks away from where you edited.Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Daniel Brandt deletion wheel war.Geni 10:52, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Really? Well, thanks though, now it's only one click away. Btw, I removed a {{User}}-template in your introduction, I don't think you wanted it there twice. :-) SoWhy 11:00, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Support
  1. Support. Judging someone from problems a year ago seems unfair as there's no problem (that I'm aware of) since then. If a new account had the edit history Geni has since then, it would probably have no problems passing RFA; it seems unfair to penalise someone for their honesty in not creating a fresh account. Enough people will be watching for various reasons that it's vanishingly unlikely Geni would do anything controversial without discussion – and I trust someone who sticks around after taking all that heat to have the welfare of the project in mind more than I'd trust someone who'd flounce off in a huff. – iridescent 12:59, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  2. Geni is highly knowledgeable on images and copyright and I've long thought that s/he is an asset to the project. naerii 13:14, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  3. I've had the pleasure of meeting Geni in real life, and can safely say that he isn't evil or crazy. He's very dedicated to this, and related projects like Commons, very knowledgable, and has been around for years. The wheel war was over 18 months ago. It's long-forgotten history. Strongly endorse this candidate! Majorly 13:31, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  4. Yes, of course. user:Everyme 13:34, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  5. Per iridescent. An excellent user who used (and hopefully will use) tools very well. I'm sorry that you were desysopped in the first place. --LordSunday 13:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  6. I spprtd last time, and does so agains. Mahalo. --Ali'i 13:50, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  7. Support - Geni is a good guy, and I'm pleased to see him run again. A couple of lapses in judgements let to Jimbo getting involved with his desysopping - I honestly doubt that he would have been desysopped if Jimbo didn't fire up his steward bit. I believe that a long time has passed since these incidents, and Geni can once again make a fantastic admin. Ryan Postlethwaite 13:53, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  8. Support Iridescent raises the most important points already. Geni will be more closely watched than any other RfA candidate and knows full well that the mop will be taken from him in a fraction of a second if he returns to the style that lead to abovementioned ArbCom-case. That said, I see no reason to deny him the mop, seeing that he did not in fact revert back to that old self yet and I am a firm believer that people can change. It's worth the risk, so to speak :-) SoWhy 13:53, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Why 'mob'? Avruch 14:54, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    No doubt a typo of "mop". Majorly 15:02, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Three times on one page? I thought it might be a clever reference to how admins get "mobbed" or have to deal with a "mob" of vandals and POV warriors or something. Avruch 15:57, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Subconsciously maybe. I rather think it's because I am kind of ill today and thus make more mistakes than usual. Yes, of course I meant "mop". SoWhy 16:59, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  9. Support per Iridescent and meeting my criteria for adminship. —] (] · ]) 14:39, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  10. Support based on conduct over the last year. PhilKnight (talk) 15:07, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  11. Support - desysopping Geni indefinitely was excessive. Geni always did an outstanding job as an admin - in particular, his/her work with image issues stands out in my mind. --B (talk) 15:14, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  12. It's been five months since the last request, and I supported that one too. Geni's a good user and while he's made mistakes, I think he's learned from them. Acalamari 15:18, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  13. Hello, I am here to see my parole officer, and...oh, wrong queue. Support, of course! :) Ecoleetage (talk) 15:28, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    !!! Haha! user:Everyme 15:44, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  14. Support due to no memorable negative intereactions. --Happy editing! Sincerely, Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles 16:50, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  15. Support knowledgeable and helpful on copyright issues. --Rividian (talk) 17:54, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  16. Support RMHED (talk) 19:09, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  17. Support. It's been well over a year since the desysopping. I think Geni should have the tools back.-gadfium 20:38, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  18. Support, Geni has been here a long, long time and has always demonstrated great dedication to the project. I have no worries that he'll abuse the tools. --MPerel 20:55, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  19. Support per Misplaced Pages's (supposed) policy of a second chance. Hell, we do it in the UK with murderers and suchlike - I guarantee Geni isn't that bad :P weburiedoursecretsinthegarden 21:14, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  20. Support. A dedicated Wikipedian with a wealth of experience. His conduct since the desysopping (which was almost 18 months ago, making it practically ancient history in wiki-time) does not raise any concerns, and I believe he has mellowed somewhat since then. the wub "?!" 22:17, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  21. Support - despite all the hate in these comments, I find nothing that has been brought up in the opposes to be worrying at all. --T-rex 23:20, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  22. I don't want to go neutral on this, so it's support on the condition he'll be de-sysopped immediately if he fugs up again. Give the guy a second chance. One remark: Geni, please, get your ,-key fixed.    SIS  23:41, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Medical science is working on the problem but I'm generaly sceptical about the chances of doing much about dyslexia in adults.Geni 23:52, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  23. He's a dedicated user. He's messed up, as all of us have. Give him a chance. --I'm an Editorofthewiki 23:53, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Oppose
  1. Oppose — I view self-noms as prima facie evidence of power hunger. Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 15:20, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Doesn't the fact that Geni could have appealed directly to the ArbCom first instead of going through the friendly neighbourhood chat that is RfA sort of ease your concern? user:Everyme 15:50, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Note: Some comments which are not related to the discussion at hand moved to the talk page. Everyone, please keep it on track and focus your comments on this discussion. user:Everyme 19:13, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  2. Oppose Astonishingly brief and vague self-nom statement by a de-sysopped former admin. Its hard to believe there isn't an assumption that no-one without an intimate knowledge of the details and personnel of the Daniel Brandt affair (never mind any anyone who's only joined in the last "1 year and 5 months") would care to be involved with this RFA. The initial omission of a link to the de-sysop decision page is an ominous oversight - sloppy, if indeed one is comfortable to WP:AGF and accept the somewhat disingenuous 'but-it's-right-there!' when prompted to provide it. However, I am not convinced that any possibly forthcoming expansive explanations / justifications / promises could dispell my reservations, which really boil down to considering The Ultimate Project Gain. Future Oversight may endeavour their best to ensure the candidate can't get Happy with the tools again but I can't see the drama and effort being sufficiently worth it. Certainly, the candidate has not provided a self-nomination statement to justify it either. Plutonium27 (talk) 15:35, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  3. Oppose per vague and brief self-nom, short and sloppy answers to questions, especially Q1, and general sloppiness that doesn't really clear up my concerns. Erik the Red 2 (AVE·CAESAR) 17:51, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Of course my answer to question one is short. I've been an admin before and been one for a fairly long time. I know that, long term, statements that you will work in a certain area don't mean much.Geni 19:51, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    I'm a little confused by the two above opposes. Are we assessing the candidate here, or their nomination statement and answers? Of course these can provide insights into a candidate, but I don't think they should be the be all and end all. (Note this is an RfA trend that has concerned me for some time, I'm not just picking on you two - if anyone wants to move this to talk I won't object) the wub "?!" 22:23, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  4. Oppose I don't really mind too much about vagueness, however, I am still perturbed about your history and I'm having a difficult time getting past it. Wheel warring, edit warring with a sock account. No. I opposed the candidate back in March, and I'm still opposing now. Wisdom89 (T / ) 18:29, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  5. Oppose. We all know I'm a critic of this, plus it takes a lot to get desysopped. I can't in good conscience support. Wizardman 18:45, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    You realise I've created more of those systems post de-adminship that before?Geni 19:15, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Right. Wizardman 20:42, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  6. Oppose I can in no way trust that this user will use the tools responsibly. Regranting access may only serve to damage the project further. SashaNein (talk) 19:22, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  7. Oppose based on the Arbcon findings from the Daniel Brandt wheel war and the answer to Q10. JPG-GR (talk) 19:24, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  8. Oppose As per Plutonium27. --Kaaveh (talk) 19:33, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  9. Oppose per Wisdom89. --Winger84 (talk) 19:50, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  10. Oppose I'm trying to wrap my head around the particularly parsimonious prose (sorry, couldn't help it) in the answer to my question. In my opinion the only valid question for a new admin is whether or not they can be trusted to use the tools properly. Different people make that determination in different ways, but here we have a case where the community (or some subset of) explicitly made that decision in the past. I'm not saying that Jimbo and arbcom have to be right here but I also don't see any contrition about past actions. Either they were wrong (broadly or narrowly) and the user is applying to regain the tools via normal channels or they were right (broadly or narrowly) and the user has changed in such a manner as to void the past concerns. The answers to Q10 don't show a defense of past actions or contrition. I'm sorry. Protonk (talk) 20:01, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  11. Oppose - remarkably terse answers to the optional questions highlight overall poor communication - even on this RfA, the candidate's seeming aversion towards commas makes understanding him somewhat tricky at times. I believe that administrators with poor language skills reflect poorly on the project - it's similar to seeing a 300 pound slouch working the front desk of a weight loss clinic. Badger Drink (talk) 20:04, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    I have access to the OTRS permissions queue. Adminship will thus have pretty much zero impact on how much I'm appearing at the front desk.Geni 20:10, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  12. Oppose from Neutral I would love to support, as I believe in second chances, but I honestly must go along with Wisdom89. Good luck. America69 (talk) 21:25, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  13. Absolutely not. seresin ( ¡? ) 22:07, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    The above links in your vote are broken --T-rex 23:23, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    No, they're not.    SIS  23:42, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  14. Weak Oppose Per answer to Q1; very sloppy and short.--LAAFan 22:57, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  15. Oppose - First 3 questions are too short. Macy 23:46, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  16. Oppose Weak answers and too problematic history with the tools. Should have included a link to arb case and discussed it upfront. Sumoeagle179 (talk) 23:56, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
Neutral
  1. I probably won't change to either support or oppose, but I was worried about the findings on the Brandt wheel war. "Geni has a history of inappropriate use of admin tools. Notable misuses have included a protect/unprotect war on an Arbitration Committee election page, an edit war over the site notice, and unprotection of an article listed at WP:OFFICE." Can you please elaborate on the findings (a simple explanation of what happened) and how you would do things differently if each incident occurs again. Cheers. —Dark 11:15, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    The first would have been countering an attempt to protect a question page. I don't think that that is likely to happen again. The sitenotice issue was one of trying to prevent overuse. These days I would probably open a discussion at the village pump or something. The article was not in fact listed at WP:OFFICE and I didn't uprotected it. But that is just technicalities. At the time pages under OFFICE protection appeared to get forgotten. To me this is what appeared to have happened in this case. The pulling of the protection a couple of days latter suggests I was right. These days the foundation is rather better organised so I would not make such an assumption.Geni 11:26, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  2. Neutral so far, sorry. It's not been massively long since your last request and I'm not sure all that much has changed since then. I'm concerned that your reputation for edit-warring (and the multiple-account edit-warring thing) will not mix well with the admin tools - Alison 11:21, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    Neutral for now I can't support per the two neutral statements above me. America69 (talk) 13:57, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  3. Neutral for the moment as this develops. It seems like geni is too quick to judgment, too quick to take action - and also less willing than he ought to be to question himself before or after taking what he sees as decisive action. I agree that his history since losing his bit has been without serious incident, that I'm aware of, which speaks well for him. On the other hand, he hasn't been an admin in that time period (obviously) so his opportunity for unilateral or hasty action has been limited. Perhaps his answers to further questions or the comments of others will sway me to switch to one of the other two sections. Avruch 14:54, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
    I should say, too, that I appreciate his help and his approach on the Giovanni di Stefano article which we both edit. That is an area where I find his direct approach in discussion refreshing, and where he has shown the appropriate restraint with editing the article itself. Avruch 14:57, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  4. Neutral for now. On the one hand, Geni was trusted enough to become an admin once before; and I'm a strong believer in rehabilitation, so I don't think being desysopped almost 18 months ago should stop him from becoming one again. On the other hand, I do have concerns about his more recent conduct - the previous RFA contained some evidence of edit-warring (although that too is now about six months old). His answers to questions are too brief and uninformative to be of much help making a judgement one way or another. As such, I'm sitting on the fence on this one - it needs more thought before I can come to a clear conclusion. Terraxos (talk) 22:21, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
  5. Neutral. I tended toward oppose when I first saw this page because the nomination statement did not link Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Daniel Brandt deletion wheel war. I've been studying the discussion here and the related issues since then and (in spite of typos and strange syntax/grammar on his user page ;-) I'm tending toward support. The nominee certainly knows how to use the tools, but I'm still unsure about whether or not he can be trusted to use them uncontroversially. — Athaenara ✉ 00:00, 22 August 2008 (UTC)