Wikipedia:Requests for bureaucratship/Riana/Bureaucrat discussion: Difference between revisions

I am not comfortable being the sole bureaucrat to determine the outcome of this RfB. I do not believe an extension of time would be beneficial here - reviewing the history of the RfB, it has oscillated around similar levels of opposition and support and it seems probable that we would be looking at a similar balance in a few days time.

Numerically speaking, this RfB falls (at 85.8%) very slightly above the highest % support for an unsuccessful nomination (85.3% - Quadell) and below the lowest % support for a successful RfB (86.7% - Andre). The fact that this RfB enjoys the highest number of supporters ever has to be seen in the context that the level opposition (39 opposers) is however far higher than the highest level of opposition a successful RfB has had (16 opposers - Essjay). A relevant discussion I would draw your attention to is at Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship#RfB passing %, where there seems to be significant support for the view that demanding 90% support for bureaucrat candidates is excessive and that some reduction should be made. Although I think shifting goal posts mid-discussion is unhelpful, I think we also need to be mindful of community attitudes that form a background to this RfB. This request seems to be within the scope of discretion and I think the discussion needs to be carefully evaluated if we are to correctly determine the outcome.

Turning to the issues raised in the discussion, I think it would be correct to say that there are two primary concerns raised by those opposing:

• The fact that Riana's decision to nominate Kelly Martin for adminship calls into question her judgment
• Issues of temperament - with diffs cited of a couple of incidents involved the use of profanity/incivility

On the one hand opposition centres on very few incidents, on the other it does seem to have been such that a number of highly respected members of the community do not trust Riana to be a bureaucrat. At the moment I am rather on the fence - I am unsure how to factor in the recent discussions about what should be the correct threshhold for promoting a bureaucrat. If the test remains along the lines of "no significant opposition", then I am not convinced this request can be successful. If were are simply looking for a consensus with some form of supermajority, then that does seem to exist in this case.

WjBscribe 02:13, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

At the moment I think this request is a pass. It meets the requirements for demonstrating reasonable consensus, and has no shortage of support. Disclaimer: I opposed. Andre (talk) 02:53, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

(Edit conflict.) There has traditionally been a quite high standard for RFBs -- I think 90% support has been quoted in the past. This would ideally have been 100%, but no candidate can please everyone; a few petulant people are bound to find trivial grounds on which to object to even the wisest and most even-handed user, and were we to require absolute support, nobody would succeed. Of course, the 90% mark was established when there were far fewer users participating in these requests. We now see dramatically higher numbers in all categories, and there is no reason to expect the proportion of petulancy to change, though the ranks of the ill-tempered will increase in number. The fact that there are numerically more opposers here than in any successful RFB is hence a distraction and should not be counted as a reason this nomination should fail. It is the proportion that matters.

However, it is not the case that this nomination suffers from the efforts of a few frivolous opposers. The objections are substantive, well-documented, and generally unified: the opposition form a strong lobby, not a disparate rabble. This leads me to conclude that we should abide by the convention in this instance, and consider the request unsuccessful. — Dan | talk 02:58, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm torn by this request since I think it's clear that there is a great deal of support. Yet, the opposition is well-reasoned even if I don't necessarily agree with it. Compared to other successful candidacies, this candidacy does not seem to have the same overall sense of support. On the whole, I would be inclined to consider this request unsuccessful, though I am somewhat ambivalent. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 05:30, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

If my memory serves, in the past, we've regarded >90% as a probable pass, <85% as a probable fail, and 85 - 90% as the area requiring particularly close attention. This RfB is on the lower side of that range, and has been within the range for the past few days. WJBscribe offers an excellent summary of the main reasons for opposition, and in general the opposes are unusually well explained. Many support comments have explicitly addressed these reasons for opposition, and some have questioned the relevance of her co-nomination of Kelly Martin to bureaucratship. There are a small number of neutral comments, of which three state that they are leaning towards support. In summary, this is within the range commonly given particularly close consideration. In my view, a small number of issues have been raise, have been fully considered, and there are nonetheless a large majority in favour of Riana becoming a bureaucrat. It's a finely balanced one, but I would call it as just sufficient to constitute a consensus. Warofdreams talk 10:51, 6 March 2008 (UTC)