G'day Chris,

<snip: articles spend too much time in CAT:CSD/>

I thought we had over 1000 admins. Granted CSD is a task not many should do, but shouldn't we make a system so that there's an "admin on duty" or an easier way to see what admins are online to help?

One of my primary tasks as an admin was clearing up CAT:CSD. As someone else pointed out recently, clearing CSD is painstaking, stressful work. You get abuse from people who don't understand what was wrong with their article (this can be handled relatively easy with diplomacy, but it all adds up). You get picked on by vandals who don't like the thought of any opposition from admins. You get exposed to all sorts of crap (e.g. running across articles that are nothing more than a picture of tubgirl or whatever). You get abuse from watchdogs wanting to know how you could possbily have (accidentally) deleted article X. You get abuse, worst of all, from CVU taggers wanting to know why admins are going rouge and ignoring their commands.

On top of that, it takes *ages* to clear a backlog. Copyvios often take a long time to check out. Improper tagging needs to be checked out. Vandalism needs to be checked out. Backlinks need to be removed. Talkpages need to be consulted. Often, it's worthwhile (but time-consuming) to follow-up with the author of a deleted article so they understand what you're doing and why.

It's tough, and it's annoying. It's definitely worthwhile, and if I resume adminship it's something I'll focus on once more (glutton for punishment); but I don't blame others for not wanting to step up to the plate.

And that's all without mentioning that admins are not agents tasked specifically with vandalism cleanup or deleting pages. There's plenty of admins who have the powers because they find them occasionally useful (e.g. performing the odd history merge and so on) and because they can be trusted with them, but don't actually use them that often. This is fine, and those admins shouldn't be pressured into clearing out backlogs and so on. New admins, also, should not be required to commit to such tasks. That's one apect of adminship, but it's not all that the buttons are for.

Cheers,