Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Wrp103

The following discussion is preserved as an archive of a successful request for adminship. Please do not modify it.

wrp103 (Bill Pringle)

Voice your opinion (45/9/4); Scheduled to end 20:44, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

wrp103 (talk · contribs) - wrp103 (Bill Pringle) has been a trustworthy editor since 2004. He's made over 4000 edits (see edit summary here, and has been active in reverting and preventing vandalism, and issuing warning messages. He is also a member of the Wikipedia:Welcoming committee. He also appears to have fully subscribed to Wikipedia philosophy. I've seen him take a strong, but very civil and constructive, stand in favor of WP:NPOV. In all, I think he would make a good admin. COGDEN 17:26, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I accept the nomination. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 01:35, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia in this capacity. Please take the time to answer a few generic questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. What sysop chores do you anticipate helping with?

A: I have been fairly active monitoring and reverting vandalism, and plan to continue that activity. I don't understand why some people feel to need to vandalize, but they do. I expect to monitor WP:AIV.

What I do not expect to do is use any administrative abilities related to any pages that I contribute to regularly. I strive for NPOV and feel that might raise conflict of interest issues. There may be some obvious exceptions, of course, but in general I would try to keep out of the way. I am a Mormon, which is included in the List of controversial issues, so I am not unfamiliar with POV arguments. IMHO it would be totally inappropriate for me to use any administrative abilities in any related issues.

2. Of your articles or contributions to Wikipedia, are there any with which you are particularly pleased, and why?

A: That is kinda like asking me which of my grandchildren I like best. ;^) I tend to contribute towards articles that are of interest to me, and therefore try to make them as good as possible. I have a wide range of interests, and so my watchlist has been getting longer and longer, so in some cases my contributions have been more keeping the article clean (reverting vandalism, fixing formatting issues, etc.) than lots of original content.

Having said that, there are some articles that are representative of my edit history:

Cheryl Wheeler is the article that got me started at Wikipedia. I am a big fan and run her web site. I checked out the article (which was a bare stub) and added significant content ... which then got mostly reverted. ;^) Fortunately, the person who ripped my contribution to shreds did it gently, and I have since added most of the current content.
Mormons and Christianity I am very pleased with the way this article is developing. We have somehow managed to avoid all the POV rancor that often shows up in these kinds of articles. Both sides have been honestly trying to understand the other and create a balanced NPOV article.
Debugging is another stub that I worked into an article.
Final Fantasy (series) - I've contributed to a number of FF articles (my favorite RPG ... how many 60-somethings have you heard say that? ;^) The reason I list this article is because it is a good example of what I call "content creep". IMHO, an article like this one should present an overview of the series, pointing the reader to other articles for more information. There are two types of readers - somebody who has never played any FF games and wants to know what all the fuss is about, and somebody like me who has played every game multiple times, has purchased all the re-releases, and even bought platforms simply because a FF title was there. ;^) The casual reader only wants to know an overview of the topic, and that is the audience that I try to focus on. There are some, however, that feel the need to include every detail, exception, etc. known to mankind. This leads to a ton of detail that probably drives a lot of casual readers away. I originally tried to simply remove the detail, but it would crop up again within a few weeks. What I have since tried to do is move the details down to footnotes and/or to separate articles and include a pointer so that the casual reader can simply read the content and the fans can find all the juicy details. Every so often, I do a major purge of the detail sections and create a new page or a new section on some detailed page. This illustrates one of my basic approaches to conflict: that rather than confronting content creep directly, I diverted it into a footnote or a more detailed article. Hopefully, the article meets the needs of both types of readers.

There is a list on my user page of more articles and what I contributed.

In addition to articles, I get a great deal of satisfaction stamping out vandalism. ;^) I created a section on my user page that allows me to copy and paste templates into talk pages. I also included some tutorial text for anyone who might be interested. Once somebody vandalizes a page on my watchlist I leave them a user warning message, add them to my watchlist, and then check their other contributions to see if there is any more damage left around. In the process I have learned about a number of topics I probably wouldn't have learned about otherwise (and a few I wish I hadn't. ;^) I had the same kind of fun when the Wiki Syntax Project was active, when I got to visit interesting pages. During the few times when I have nothing else to do (or need a break from monitoring recent changes), I will visit random pages. I've even fixed a few obvious typos on topics I knew next to nothing about.

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 firmly believe that the only person who can give me stress is myself. We can't control what happens to us, but we can control how we react to it. So no, I haven't gotten any stress from users, but yes, I have had a number of editing conflicts over the years. I have found that there are some people who seem incapable of understanding NPOV, and the rest of us have trouble maintaining it, especially when it involves our belief systems. There are some that seem to believe NPOV means something that they agree with. IMHO, many times they aren't deliberately creating POV edits, they just don't recognize alternative ways a statement can be interpreted. And while there are some who are strong POV pushers, I give most people the benefit of the doubt for as long as possible. Since the question asks about future behavior, I should add that I expect to continue to deal respectfully with people.

The most recent edit conflict was concerned with the First Vision article. Discussions can be found here and here. The "edit war" itself ran between 5 April and 6 April. As you can see, I try to arrive at a consensus and usually keep snide comments and other non-constructive comments to a minimum.

I was caught in the middle of an AfD issue for Jeff Lindsay. The original page got deleted as a vanity page, so I created a new one that got flagged for deletion again. I'm not proud, so I asked for help from several folks who had helped with other issues in the past. Fortunately, the page was kept (mostly thanks to others). If you read the discussion page for the second AfD nomination, you will see a number of my comments responding to critics. That should give you an idea of how I deal with others.

If anyone is interested, I can dig out some more examples.

Optional question from —dgies^t_c

4. What conditions must be present for an IP user to be blocked based on a report to WP:AIV for vandalism? Please be specific.

A: Let me answer that in two parts. The criteria I use to nominate someone is that they have clearly been vandalizing, and have been given enough warnings in a reasonably short length of time (warnings from a couple weeks/months ago wouldn't count.) Then, if they clearly vandalize after the final warning (i.e., not shortly after the last warning and they might have missed it), I will nominate them. Part 2 - According to the admin guide, in addition to the criteria I normally use to submit, any nominations that involve things other than straight vandalism should be handled elsewhere (like 3RR, edit wars, pov, etc.) I would check the actual edits associated with the warnings, and if it wasn't obvious, I would probably also check out the person who reported, just to make sure there isn't a personality issue. Did I answer your question sufficiently? wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 03:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Charlotte says

5. BigDT's comment about reciting "image use policy backwards" made me giggle so much I wondered if it was an inside joke, so I decided to see for myself. I noticed you've uploaded exactly one image on the English Wikipedia (and apparently do not have an account at Wikimedia Commons). So I examined that image, which tagged as "fair use" which appears to simply convey the likeness of Cheryl Wheeler, a musician who, is still alive and still "touring extensively". as stated in the article (granted, I have never heard of her). So I was going to ask "Wouldn't it be easy to replace this with a freely-licensed image?" but then I noticed your upload comment:

14:09, October 23, 2006 Wrp103 (Talk | contribs) uploaded "Image:Web CherylStmtofIntent.jpg" ({{Promotional}} - Uploaded by ~~~, who runs Cheryl's web site)

At that point I almost asked, "If you are the webmaster of a Cheryl Wheeler web site which this image is "from", and since (I would hope) you either own the rights to this image (or maybe some other images) of Cheryl Wheeler (maybe you even know her personally)... or you have reached some agreement with the actual copyright holder(s). So, if one of these scenarios is true, wouldn't it be easy for you to get at least one photo of Ms. Wheeler released to under a free license?"

But then I looked at the history of the Cheryl Wheeler article, which has seen 58 edits, half of them by you, in the three years since you created the article.

So I'd like to get a better feel for how well you understand a handful of polices/guidelines. Of course, nobody really understands all of them, but I'd like to at least know what these ones mean to you:

Thanks. — CharlotteWebb 12:04, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A: I hope you don't mind, but I will answer these questions in two phases. As I mentioned elsewhere, I hadn't planned on getting nominated at this point, and it turns out this is one of the worst weeks for me to be responsive here. (My boss just gave me a rush program to write and my evenings are already booked Tues-Fri of this week.) I will give you a brief answer now and a more detailed answer later tonight.

First, some minor points. I have actually uploaded two images: The K&R book cover (see C (programming language)). (I am horrible with images - if you go to Cheryl's web site and click on "pictures" you will see "coming soon" which has been there for a while.) Also, my edits to Unisys and 3DVE are more likely to be considered conflict of interest since I am an employee of Unisys.

As for Cheryl, I take great pains to make sure people know that I run her website, which is why I stated that above when I listed her article, and why I added that comment to the image upload. The short answer for the image is that I asked her manager for permission but never got a response. Since that picture is one of a number of images that he sent me top post on the website for promoters, and knows that I have a clause on my website that anything can be used to promote Cheryl, I wasn't worried. The fair use description certainly fit her, so I uploaded the image. I should also point out (and encourage you to double check it by visiting the web site) that I don't get paid for maintaining that web site. In fact, her manager was less than enthusiastic when I started. (To be fair, this was long before the web and back in the rec.music.folk days of yesteryear. ;^) I would hope I haven't done any POV edits on any of those pages (except, of course, for my first few edits. ;^) I will go into more detail later. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 14:53, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Okay - I have more time ... let me answer your questions in more detail.

Yes, I know Cheryl and yes, I run her web site. As I said above, I receive no payment for any of what I do. I do, however, receive advance copies of her CDs, she puts me on her guest list, and other perks like that. If you look on her website [1] you will see that I am totally responsible for the contents of the website. I don't receive directions from Cheryl or her manager for any content I write (although Cheryl will point out factual errors ever so often). Until recently, I called it "The Unofficial Official Cheryl Wheeler Site" because the entire content was generated by me, but Cheryl, her manager, her agent, and her record label all referred to my site as Cheryl's site. Once her manager understood the importance of a web presence, he needed the site to become official. He wanted to pay me, which I again refused, and so we compromised - I still generate the content on my own, but I dropped the catchy title and made it so the casual visitor could easily believe it is a normal official site. I moved the disclaimers to below the fold under the "About" section. You will also find on the bottom of each page the statement:

While it is true that I copyright the content, I also allow others to use is. (If you read the handouts at her concerts, they often quote from the site.) Actually, none of the text I added to the Wikipedia article were copied from the site, although the content is basically the same.

My initial few edits were the first I made on Wikipedia and didn't really understand any of the policies. My first version was very fan-related, but after it got ripped apart, I sort of figured out what was wanted, and continued to build the initial article from there. Later, I learned about OR, which raised an interesting situation. I suppose I could have referenced my web site as a source, but that didn't seem right, so I left the article unsourced. I really can't justify removing any of the article because I don't have references. IMHO, somebody could go to the site, find the information and add a reference to the article. If anyone else were writing the article, they could go to the site, summarize what they read and add a reference to the site. IMHO that would be perfectly acceptable.

As for WP:COI, I don't believe I violated it since I'm not paid for my work on the site. I also believe my contributions (after the first few) were accurate and NPOV. I can see where others might think COI apply (especially the "too close" principle), and would encourage them to examine the article and challenge or remove any sections they think are inappropriate. While I realize the reason for COI, I am also a firm believer of ignoring all rules when necessary. Each of us (I assume) write about articles that we care about and have some amount of expertise and/or are interested in. I also believe that I am able to separate my thoughts and feelings from what I write in an article. I think that is a basic principle behind NPOV. There needs to be a balance between interest and bias. I believe that Cheryl Wheeler is one of the greatest singer/songwriters around. I certainly can't say that in the article, even though I can find references that make that claim (including ones that I didn't create! ;^) If you look at the history for that article, the last content edit I made was Oct 2006, except for a minor correction to somebody's description of a song that was made Feb 2007. It is unlikely that I would add any more significant content to the article, although I will continue to monitor it.

The next topic you asked about is WP:OR. I must admit that I have a lot of problems with this sometimes. I understand the need for it, and would love to see actual references when practical. There are some cases where finding references can be difficult. You can read some of my comments at Talk:Final Fantasy (series)#Citations, Take Two. I have already discussed this issue with my dilemma about Cheryl's article. There is a fine line sometimes between common knowledge and OR, and I struggle with this issue a number of times. What I have found for the Final Fantasy (series) is that when somebody adds something they think is common knowledge but the rest of us don't. It would be great if we could always find references, but in some cases the references themselves are disputed. For example, consider the article Anti-Mormonism. People can find references to "prove" both sides of the argument, so what is the correct interpretation?

The last was WP:OWN. I think that if you were to examine my edit history, you would be hard pressed to find anywhere that I reacted to somebody changing what I wrote, except for factual and POV disputes. Actually, there are a number of times when I deliberately add some poorly worded statement hoping that somebody will come along later and make it sound better.

My guess is that I gave you waay too much information, but hopefully it will help you understand how I think. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 04:06, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Optional questions from Simply south

Excellent questions. If you don't mind, I will also answer this in two phases. Hopefully I will remember to sign these responses. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 19:30, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

6 Of your articles and contributions to Wikipedia, are there any of which you are not proud of? Why? Simply south 18:48, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A Quick answer: Singer-songwriter. It has turned into nothing more than a list of favorite unknowns and a few people others have heard of. :-( I have tried several times to strip it down, but it kept creeping back. I finally added (or was it someone else?) a comment that they couldn't add any more without discussing them on the talk page. That has limited content creep (see FF above), but the article is still a mess. I wish I had more time to work on this, but until we can get a consensus of what the article is about, it will continue to be a mess. Part of the problem is that half of us use the term for artists who travel the coffee-house and folk festival circuit, while others consider anyone who performs and has written a song. Both definitions are valid, and unfortunately both use the same term for their definitions. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 19:30, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

7 What other activities do you hope to help out with if you become an admin?

A I think I am giving people the wrong impression. There are no activities that I would not do; I simply don't know enough about all of them to give an answer that I would be willing to live with. I could make up something nice about "I plan to be more active in AFD, CSD, FOOBAR, and ZORK", but I would rather give you an honest answer. At the risk of sounding evasive, I am serious about my comment that I am volunteering to help. I am the type of person that when I see an odd item in the wrong place in the supermarket will carry the item over to where it belongs. I don't have a preconceived notion of where I could best help, and am (and will continue to be) open to any and all suggestions. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 19:30, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Optional question from Naconkantari:

8. When is it appropriate to implicitly invoke WP:IAR? Explicitly? Are there times when it should not be invoked? Naconkantari 17:23, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A If you can come up with a good case that the spirit of a rule can best be served by ignoring the letter of the rule, them WP:IAR makes sense. I realize that isn't being explicit, but that is the rule of thumb that I think should be used. As for when it should not be used, the general rule should be never ... unless you have a good reason. ;^)

For example, as I mentioned earlier the issue of citations for Final Fantasy (series), the desire for citations has to be balanced with the availability of citations. Since the article is about an ongoing series, any citation you use will (or at least can) become outdated when the next title in that series is released. While it is very easy to find reviews and articles about a specific FF title, it is much harder to find one specifically about the entire series, and when found, you would have to check the date to determine if it is obsolete or not.

Another example I've seen is for Knot and Folk Dance articles. WP:NOT indicates that Wikipedia is not a "how to" source, but it doesn't make a lot of sense to have an article about a knot or dance without some description of how you make/do it. Every so often, somebody tries to claim that gamefaqs isn't an appropriate site to link to because it has a blog. If those aren't enough examples, let me know and I could go on.

You certainly should not invoke it just because it is convenient, and if others call your reasoning to question, you should probably not try to push the issue. There are lots of things that make sense to one of us but sound completely wacko to the rest of us. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) (Talk) 17:58, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Optional question from Iuio:

9. If you become an admin, would you encourage any users with the potential to become admins, to request adminship? What is you advice to anyone seeking to become an admin? (Iuio 04:42, 15 April 2007 (UTC))[reply]

A I don't feel I have a sufficient grasp of all the duties/capabilities of an admin to answer that question for sure. I would most likely wait for somebody to ask me about being an admin rather than go out and try to convince people to become one. Although this particular nomination has been quite painless, I could see that it could be a problem for people who lack self-confidence, are easily offended, etc. For example, the complaints about my lack of editing history in WP space is somewhat surprising, but to me it is an interesting situation; to others it could be a crushing blow. If the potential candidate has seemed somewhat sensitive in past situations, then I might even discourage them from applying, or at least warn them that there will be people who will oppose and criticize them.

If someone is quite happy being an editor and has not expressed any interest in being an admin, why ruin a good thing? Now, if my nomination is approved and I find out there are gaping holes that need to be fixed by more admins, then I might change my mind about that. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) ^(Talk) 05:09, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I just realized I didn't address your question about what advice I would give to somebody who wanted to become an administrator. The first question I would ask them is "why do you want to become one?" I suspect that some view admin as an endorsement of some sort, or it makes them important, they want to control, etc. Such motivations would be an excellent reason to discourage and/or oppose such a nomination. IMHO, if they feel they must do something to become an administrator (other than apply, of course) then I would be suspicious / nervous. While it makes sense to wonder if you are ready to become an admin, doing something specifically to increase your chances is like doing charity work so that others will think well of you. Doing the right thing for the wrong reason cancels out much of the good that could otherwise be done. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) ^(Talk) 11:57, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

General comments

See wrp103's edit summary usage with mathbot's tool. For the edit count, see the talk page.
There are many areas of Wikipedia that I am not familiar with. Not because I'm not interested, but more because I tend to focus on whatever I'm doing, and so far my activities have filled up most of my spare time. I enjoy learning new things, and expect this application process to open my eyes to other areas that will be of interest to me. For example, I only recently joined the welcoming committee - not because I wasn't interested, but I hadn't known about it. I've been welcoming people for a long time, but didn't think to look for a group to join. One of the things I like about Wikipedia is that you can do the right thing pretty much whenever you want - revert vandalism, welcome and/or help people, etc. I guess that is one reason why I didn't consider adminship earlier.

I have been teaching for a long time. I enjoy teaching complex, intellectually challenging courses, but I also enjoy helping newbies learn. IMHO, there is nothing better than seeing the light come on in the eyes of somebody who just grokked a difficult subject. That is one reason why I like to welcome people and help newbies figure things out. In many cases, I've had to learn how to do it first, and then help the person who asked for help.

Please keep criticism constructive and polite.

Discussion

Are you accepting your RFA? Simply south 23:18, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I just noticed this question (sorry about that). I've answered it other places, but to reiterate: "yes". —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wrp103 (talk • contribs) 18:19, 11 April 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Way to go, Bill ... impress them with how savy you are here. (I shouldn't try to do this in quick bursts. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 18:48, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Some have expressed concern about my lack of experience in certain areas. While I don't agree that is a problem, I can certainly understand the concerns. Perhaps it would help to know that I am a software engineer, have been programming since the 1960's; I have been solely responsible for the support of a mainframe O/S (IBM TSS when at CMU), worked on Unix internals when at Bell of PA (not Bell Labs, a local department - and not the kernel), and have been a system administrator a number of times. This means that I am used to having (and respect) powerful tools, and know what it is like to be able to crash machines, destroy data, and cause all kinds of havoc for large numbers of people. Having the admin tools won't go to my head, and wherever possible, I would probably set up a testbed under my user page to try things out for the first time. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) (Talk) 13:13, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support

Support as per nomination COGDEN 20:45, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OMG ONLY 4000 EDITS U GOTZ NO EXPERIENCE Support. Just understand that there will be some things that you aren't interested in, and doing them anyway is harmful, both to you and the project. -Amarkov moo! 20:51, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
(changed to neutral)
Support - Good Answers..--Cometstyles 20:57, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - I have worked with him a long time and I have always appreciated his level headed approach in working in difficult situations. Were I an admin, I would have recommended him myself. --Storm Rider ^(talk) 21:17, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - adminship is no big deal. If a user wants to do nothing but patrol backlogs all day, that's great. But if someone is mainly an article writer and would do little other than the occasional blocking of a vandal or deletion of a nonsense page, that's fine too. The question is do we trust him not to abuse the tools, not whether he can recite the image use policy backwards in Spanish while balancing a copy of the GFDL on his nose. --BigDT 00:40, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Per BigDT. -Mschel 01:12, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Tough call here. The candidate's experience is not superlative, but given his positive, candid attitude, it's enough. YechielMan 01:50, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Nothing amazing, but I think this user can be trusted with the tools. Captain panda 02:09, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - While they don't seem to have a great need for the tools, they seem very level-headed and unlikely to abuse them as well. —dgies^t_c 03:17, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - Sensible, enough experience, shows no signs of going nuts with the tools, that's good enough here. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 09:59, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support meets my criteria, and he seems experienced enough.-- danntm ^T _C 14:00, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Changing !vote, see below for rationale. Good luck, Bill. Caknuck 14:49, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! I appreciate your comments. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 14:56, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - A good contributer who gave sensible and honest answers to the questions, also seems to be able to communicate with other users well. Camaron1 | Chris 15:48, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Looks good. RyanGerbil10(Упражнение В!) 19:26, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Adminship is no big deal. Walton ^{Vivat Regina!} 19:38, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I like the answers to the questions - honesty and thoughtfulness go a long way, as does being a quality editor. Coemgenus 21:08, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Support While I have concerns about the editors total amount of project space work, the edits in Wikispace and the answers to the questions above demonstrate a good attitude, a decent understanding of policy and an ability to listen to others. JoshuaZ 02:46, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support I see nothing that leads me to believe he would abuse the admin tools. Frise 02:49, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, looks sensible enough, and nothing leads me to believe that he'd use (and perhaps accidentally misuse) the tools in areas he's unexperienced with. Kusma (talk) 09:14, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Nothing in this user's contrib history makes me assume he would abuse the tools inadvertently, let alone on purpose. —Alde Baer ~~user:Kncyu38~~ 22:02, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Absolutely no sign this user will abuse the extra tools granted to admins. Great editors make great admins. - auburnpilot talk 23:12, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, appears level-headed and unlikely to abuse tools, opposition raises no significant issues. Christopher Parham (talk) 23:52, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Excellent answers; head is well-mounted on shoulders. I trust in this candidate's good sense and judgment. A Train^talk 12:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Good contributor, excellent temperament. Not every admin needs to be an XfD wonk, and this user can certainly help us with our backlogs, even if simply doesn't need to contribute to them. Cool Hand Luke 13:01, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Terence 15:19, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Tony Sidaway 18:34, 13 April 2007 (UTC) I see absolutely no reason why this longstanding editor with a wealth of tech experience shouldn't have the mop.[reply]
His first paragraph explaining the application of "Ignore all rules" is the best I've seen. --Michael Snow 18:40, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support I'm glad to see this finally happening. -Visorstuff 21:30, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Trustworthy, seems like an asset to WP. KnightLago 02:21, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Well thought-out answers show he will make sound decisions even in areas he's not currently familiar with. –Pomte 07:23, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Adminship should be available to good experienced editors regardless of how frequent we think they will use the tools. Those steeped in Wikipedia bureaucracy aren't the only ones capable of making intelligent wise decisions. Those that have shown maturity in handling conflicts and edit with proper neutrality should be trusted with the extra responsibility --Trödel 10:40, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm Mailer Diablo and I approve this message! - 17:30, 14 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Long-standing and level-headed contributor, risks of enmopping seem very small. BTW, I think the number of supporting editors from WP:LDS rises to the level of a de facto endorsement... Alai 00:13, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, Strong contributor, always uses good judgement. Extensive experience with AfD, etc. should not be a must. Bill will not misuse the tools. -MrFizyx 06:02, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Pea ceNT 08:44, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Very old and respectable editor. My support to him. --Masterbobo 10:04, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I am 62, but I would have preferred long standing. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) ^(Talk) 11:57, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Excellent answers to questions. —Mira 10:13, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Have noted the editor on many articles and worked with him on several. I've always found him to be responsible and courteous in his interaction with others. He has been particularly attentive in dealing with vandals and new editors. WBardwin 21:40, 15 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Been about a bit and not caused any problems, unlikely to start causing them if armed with a mop.--Doc^g 09:41, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Will not abuse the tools. Davewild 17:48, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Mike Christie (talk) 21:19, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. A noble aim. (Iuio 23:18, 16 April 2007 (UTC))[reply]
Support. Although we have hardly seen eye-to-eye on First Vision, I believe wrp103 (Bill Pringle) is fair-minded and certainly has the requisite maturity to be an administrator.--John Foxe 00:24, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, looks good.--Wizardman 01:36, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, experienced and well-rounded. --Mus Musculus (talk) 16:51, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, showing honesty is a good sign. Shows knowledge of some policy. Edits are evenly spread. Reasonable answers. Simply south 19:38, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose

Oppose Insufficient project-space experience; like Amarkov, I surprised to see so few edits there from someone who has been around for a while. Record is too sparse adequately to judge preparedness for the mop. Xoloz 23:05, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, sorry. Flow of contributions too scarce and unsteady. Wikipedia space count is too low. Some vandalfight, but no current need for the tools.--Hús ö nd 23:25, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As adminship is (by declaration of Jimbo) No Big Deal, the issue is clear and present danger with the tools; a statement "no need for the tools" is an irrelevant opposition criteria and should be disregarded - David Gerard 16:04, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As David Gerard has not been chosen by the community to determine what arguments are valid or not, this comment by him and all other equivalent ones should be disregarded. It is the right of each editor to decide what they consider significant in determining whether the project will be better off if another editor is given the tools. In this specific case, it is quite reasonable to believe that we take a risk every time we promote an admin, and a lack of need for tools indicates that the risk is not worth taking, so not only is David inappropriately claiming authority that he does not have, he also is just plain wrong. GRBerry 18:36, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Limited project-space experience, which an admin really does need. Also, and while this may seem a trivial pint it reflects an understanding of how wikipedia operates, you beglected to accept your RfA nomination. An admin does need to know how RfA works.--Anthony.bradbury 00:06, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The acceptance snaffu was the result of some confusion between User:COGDEN and me. I asked him to check and, if he thought the answers were detailed enough, to let me know and I would accept the nomination and we could proceed. The next I heard, he had already started the process. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 03:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Invalid opposition criterion, per above - David Gerard 16:04, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
David should be ignored, as above. Limited project space experience is not irrelevant at all, so David is wrong here again. 0 for 2 so far. GRBerry 18:39, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

~~Oppose~~ Per below, the nominee stated "The honest answer is that I'm not totally sure what I would do as an admin." Besides vandal-fighting, the nominee hasn't expressed much interest in tackling some of the other, equally as important tasks and backlogs. Plus, the relatively low number of edits in the WP and WP Talk spaces is troubling, as that's where a lot of the dirty work of running this place gets done. Caknuck 04:24, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Does every admin have to have an interest in tackling backlogs? If he blocks one vandal a week, that in and of itself is a service. --BigDT 04:42, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Let me clarify - I didn't say I wasn't interested in doing other, equally important tasks and backlogs; I said I wasn't sure what else I would be doing. I wasn't going to mention this, but based on some other comments, I think it is appropriate. I had asked several people what they thought about me becoming an admin. I also started reading the various admin guides. When I asked COGDEN, his response was to start my nomination. I hadn't planned on applying so soon, but since it is "no big deal", I figured that was fine. As explained elsewhere, my nomination started before I had formally accepted it, so this whole thing started off on the wrong foot. The reason I don't know what else I would be doing is because I'm not totally sure what the possibilities are, since I haven't finished reading all the admin docs. I can tell you, however, that I am looking for ways to help Wikipedia (which is my motivation for the application) but at the same time, I'm not the type to go "Gee, I wonder what this button does?" ;^) Regardless of what capabilities I have, I will only use them if I am confident I know what I'm doing. From what I have read, admin is given to people that can be trusted. I think I am such a person, and so I have applied.

As for the number of edits, part of that is because of my tendency to focus on whatever I'm currently doing. I don't tend to wander around poking at things to see what is there. Once I'm aware of something, I will research it and learn what I can. I spend a lot of time monitoring pages on my watchlist, making sure they don't deteriorate. My schedule can sometimes get hectic, which can limit how much time I have. I have a full-time job and teach part time; I am active in my church 10-20 hours a week; I have a wife, kids, and grandkids that I enjoy being around; and, being 62 years old, I need more sleep than I did when back in my 20's, 30's, and 40's. Nevertheless, I have been committed to spending time on Wikipedia, promoting it to others, etc. I fully expect to continue doing what I can to make Wikipedia better, regardless of the outcome of this nomination. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 07:09, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Changing !vote to "Support" based on the answer above. My chief concern was that the nominee was ambivalent towards getting the tools, and that would lead to ambivalence when judging when and how to use them. Based on Bill answer above, it seems that this impression was more due to the rapid progress of the nomination process than anything else. This answer helps settle my concerns. Caknuck 14:49, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - would suggest you try again in 6-8 weeks after participating more fully in the deletion process. Addhoc 10:55, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Irrelevant to question of whether candidate is safe to have the tools, oppose should be disregarded - David Gerard 16:04, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

David should be ignored, as per above. Additionally, this is absolutely a valid concern. Participation in the deletion process is the best possible evidence of how the candidate would be likely to use the deletion tool, which is one of the tools under consideration. GRBerry 18:39, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
They could've opposed allowing the candidate to do deletion tasks until they got the experience. I don't see why we should not allow someone to work in areas they are knowledgeable in if they happen to not have experience in one of the other fields. Take me, I rarely touch page protection unless it's for the main page. Doesn't mean I don't know the policy. - Mgm|^(talk) 20:35, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - insufficient Wikispace involvement and a weak answer to Q1, which is important. I liked the second paragraph of your answer, but I like it as an answer to a question that wasn't asked. I'm not keen on opposes based on "no need of the tools", but you've hardly asserted a solid case, particularly as AIV has fewer backlog problems these days. I'll happily support you in a future RfA if you participate in XfD and other Wikispace issues and come back with a clearer sense of what you will do, not just what you won't. Sorry if that seems harsh. --Dweller 15:41, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate your comments, and don't think they were harsh. Frankly, I'm not trying to present a solid case; I am more volunteering to help out. If the end result is "no", then I will continue to do what I've been doing (although this has opened my eyes up to a number of other areas that I will probably look into once this ~~ordeal~~ process is over. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 16:30, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I must say though that I approved of your follow-up to the point being made by Kelly Martin (although I do not agree with the concept of acceptance by a project before adminship as it seems to push this slight weird but working wiki democracy towards a form of party politics), and I approved of your reasoning that if you don't get the mop you will just go back to doing what you are doing now. Total edits in both mainspace and wikispace are too low for me to consider you are ready just now.--VS ^talk 23:30, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate your comments. I'm not sure about having a wikiproject endorse a candidate, either, although it would allow people who worked with the candidate to discuss their strengths and weaknesses. That's why I thought posting a notice on recent pages might produce good results. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) (Talk) 00:22, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This user believes that removing warnings from your talk page is vandalism ([2]). That implies that Wrp's understanding of policy is significantly lacking. >Radiant< 09:53, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
To clarify, what I said was that removing warnings from your talk page can be considered vandalism. I then gave the example of vandals that keep removing recent warning messages in order to hide the fact that they previously vandalized, and thus avoid getting blocked. I've run into a couple of these folks, BTW. I revert their deletions and explain why they shouldn't do that. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) ^(Talk) 12:25, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly. So you are, in effect, edit warring to keep text on a user talk page that the user has read but doesn't want there. >Radiant< 13:04, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That is one way to interpret it, although IMHO it has never escalated into anything close to an edit war. If a known vandal keeps deleting their uw messages in order to avoid getting higher level messages, I will watch them like a hawk and assign the appropriate level warning messages. I had one person who insisted they didn't do any vandalism, and I pointed out that somebody did, and suggested that they register and login to avoid getting associated with others that share the same IP. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) ^(Talk) 15:05, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"The fair use description certainly fit her, so I uploaded the image." No, it didn't fit then, and it doesn't fit now. Oppose due to his misunderstanding of a policy with real-world implications. — CharlotteWebb 20:11, 16 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
comment: Doesn't your statement on this reflect a somewhat recent change in policy and isn't this confusing in general? (At least, thats what I'm gathering on this after scanning through Wikipedia:Elimination of Fair Use Rationale in Promotional Photos.) I have heard of Wheeler--and seen half a dozen of her shows. Artists like this widely distribute their photo to be used by concert promoters in newspapers, posters, and on websites. While I think you are correct about image licences, Bill certianly hasn't put Wikipedia into any "real-world" risk and at one time I thought this was considered "fair use". -MrFizyx 04:23, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I realize he uploaded it six months ago, but the policy-based criteria for "fair use" for non-free content have not changed significantly between then and now. Unfortunately, neither has Bill's understanding of the policy and the reasons for it. Our goal is a free encyclopedia, in every sense of the word. Please take a camera to the next show you attend. Wikipedia will thank you for it — I know I will . — CharlotteWebb 12:40, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak oppose too little project-space experience. Nevertheless, a sound candidate. Pascal.Tesson 16:22, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral

This is giving me a bad feeling. Two people, both active for more than three years, yet neither seems to have a really keen grasp of Wikipedia. And I had to stop the nominator from messing up this guy's chances by canvassing. I am going to have to study this quite a bit. -Amarkov moo! 21:00, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate your concern for the fairness of voting, Amarkov, but in this case your concern is unfounded. There has been some discussion within a small group of long-time editors/admins as to his nomination, and I left a note on a couple of pages letting them know that I had gone ahead with the nomination. That's not canvassing. I'm a long-time admin (since 2004), but honestly I don't review the RfA pages daily to see when someone of interest gets nominated, so I appreciate being clued in on important nominations of people I've worked with, when the person cluing me in knows I have an interest. I've received word about some very great and prolific admins this way, and I wouldn't have known unless somebody told me. COGDEN 22:34, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That isn't really the big issue. My problem is more that everyone involved here seems to have an oddly small amount of experience for 3 years. Like I said, this just means that I have to study it, not that I am certain to withold support (and I wouldn't blame the candidate for other people's problems anyway). -Amarkov moo! 00:10, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would be glad to answer any questions you might have to help you decide. As for your comment about things I'm not interested in, I hope I would use care to make sure whatever I do is correct, regardless of whether or not I find it exciting. Over the years, I have learned ways to make all kinds of things interesting that would otherwise drive me crazy. ;^) I expect the same will apply here - I would look over the options and work wherever I think I could to the most good. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 03:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral - I see no serious problems with this candidate, although I wish his user page linked to the Wikipedia articles for e.g. Unisys, instead of external sites. I would likely support if only he were endorsed by a WikiProject. Kelly Martin (talk) 21:09, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I had a bad habit of not looking at my user page until recently. That top part was one of my first edits, and I haven't touched it for a while. Actually, I only started to use that page recently when I noticed other people who were using their page for bookmarks, copy-paste, etc. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 03:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is the thing about WikiProject endorsement a joke or serious? --BigDT 03:19, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It is serious. Please see my talk page for further discussion (and please do not derail this or any other RFA for that purpose). Kelly Martin (talk) 21:31, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
While I don't presume to speak for Kelly, the goal appears to get feedback from people with experience from the candidate. That sounds like a great idea to me. Looking at the people voting, only a couple have actually worked with me and have a good idea of what I am like. The rest of you are guessing, based on some statistics and my (possibly bogus) comments. One way to do this is to create a template that we can use to tag the articles that the candidate has performed multiple edits on within some recent period. The tag could say something like "User XXX has been nominated to become an administrator. You may express your support or concerns by clicking on this link." The avoids the issue of canvassing for votes, since those with positive and negative experiences could respond. Personally, I would tend to ignore the positive responses but explore the negative ones (which would probably be more frequent, anyway.) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 13:23, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral minor point, I know, but did you accept the nomination? Also, too few edits in Wikispace to show an overall understanding of WP. However, that notwithstanding, your contributions are all positive so with more experience I would support. The Rambling Man 21:46, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I accepted the nomination. I had asked User:COGDEN to check out my answers, and if he thought they were fine, I would formally accept the nomination and then he could start the process. Apparently, he missed that part and started the process and then told me. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 03:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral Reviewing your contributions, I see that you are excellent at warning vandals and issuing the appropriate tag levels on their Talk pages; more worrying is the paucity of contributions to the policy space in your time here. Most of the edits I see are to AIV and ArbCom nominations. You need to demonstrate a knowledge of the policies and guidelines in at least the XfD areas for a start. Finally, the answer to question one doesn't give me a true impression of what you would do as an admin - just block people who are reported on AIV? (aeropagitica) 21:51, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The honest answer is that I'm not totally sure what I would do as an admin. At a minimum, I would continue what I have been doing. I would also explore other areas and see where I can best contribute. I would be surprised if you were satisfied with that answer. Frankly, I'm not satisfied with it, either, but it is accurate. I would rather give you an honest answer rather than make up something that sounds good. I would like to be more involved helping Wikipedia, and this seemed like a good step. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 03:01, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The above adminship discussion is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the talk page of either this nomination or the nominated user). No further edits should be made to this page.