[WikiEN-l] Things about admins

[Fastfission]

On 7/17/06, Timwi <timwi at gmx.net> wrote:
> Yes, I do not deny that. Now -- if a user finds an admin to have done
> something wrong, does that make it likely that the admin has done
> something wrong? Obviously you'll say 'no' because there's only one user
> complaining, and everyone else sides with the admin. But read on...

Personally I think the likelihood depends on the nature of the
complaint. And one other things, while we are on this topic -- in the
end these are never just about one complaint. They are things like
"Admin X insulted me, remove their status." We look into it, and we
find that the insult is minimal if existant at all, and it comes at
the end of a long exchange in which the user has flagrantly broken
rules themselves.

Now you seem to want to interpret a situation like this as being a non
sequitur. I would object that it isn't. The real non sequitur is
committed by the user trying to use some paltry violation as an
argument for bigger repercussions. An admin's ability to be a
responsible admin is not predicated on whether or not they use polite
language with every user; it is the sum total of their work as an
admin. It is unreasonable to not take that into account.

> But we have already established on this mailing list that admins *do*
> conspire, albeit on a very subtle and subconscious level, without
> knowing it. Someone (not me!) gave this analogy with noblemen in the
> Middle Ages, who rarely if ever accused each other of a crime even if
> they knew about such a crime. If an ordinary citizen were to accuse a
> nobleman of anything, all the noblemen (who were "known to be reliable"
> and supposedly had "ability of independent assessments") would side with
> their fellow nobleman and all come to the same conclusion in his favour.

On issues of real merit there is plenty of dissention both on the list
and on WP:AN. On issues with almost no merit, there is almost no
discussion. (And no, I'm not saying that the amount of discussion is
an indicator of merit -- only the converse. There is plenty of
discussion for things without merit, too.)

> A-ha! Doesn't this explain the above effect then? If a majority of
> admins agree with a decision, then the decision is less likely to be
> questioned (and, consequently, the complaining user is taken less
> seriously). Therefore, admins will agree with each other in order to
> reduce the likelihood of being questioned. This is the "benefit of
> agreeing with each other" that you were looking for. :)

Uh, sorry, I don't see that. If you want to make an argument about
convenience, argue instead that many admins would sooner just abstain
from contributing to an issue -- even if they think another admin is
wrong -- because they have other things to do. But to claim that
people actively agree with each other just to be expedient is both
without evidence and silly. I'll admit to not paying attention to
every issue, even if I could conceivably have an opinion of it, but
I'll never fake an opinion. (You could, of course, postulate that
subconsciously I agree because I want to expedite, but now you're not
only asserting something rather large about the abilities of humans to
think freely at all, but you're also substituting abstract and
unprovable psychological explanations for ones based on individual
rational action. Take your pick; I find the latter to be simpler in
this case.)

> Now, does "the way things are done on Wikipedia" refer to the spirit of
> the policies, or the behaviour of admins in practice? We all know that
> there are significant differences between those two.

The mixture of the two which accounts for how admins generally act.
They generally do not always act to the letter of the policies, but
they often do act within the spirit of them and to the ends with which
they were developed. Which is the way that all "organizations" act.

> Such as?

Such as many of the ones which end up on this list. If you want to
start pulling out examples now, I'll let YOU start with that. You're
the one trying to make a grand theory.

> Of course it is easy for you to claim that someone has "absolutely no
> regard for policy XYZ", but surely most of the time it is more likely a
> misunderstanding of the spirit of the policy (by either side!), or just
> complete ignorance of a less obvious policy. It is, for example, not
> intuitive that we should have a policy on "notability" or
> "verifiability", so why should anyone look that up?

Sure. In my experience users usually get pointed to the right policy
pretty early on. There are nice rational reasons for that as well. If
I tell somebody about 3RR and the consequences, and they violate it
anyway, I can, with a clear conscience, block them for the violation.
If I tell them about NPOV and they ignore it happily, it just makes it
easier to deal with them. It's in my interest to tell them about the
policy, because it makes it clear that ignorance is not the cause of
their actions.

I take a lot of time to make sure that users who are obviously just
confused about Wikipedia understand how it works. Usually they are
pretty easy to spot, in comparison with people who have malicious
intent.

And yes, I'm happy to assert that there are people with malicious
intent. I could go through a list of the epithets I've had directed at
me from POV-pushers, if you're interested. They include things like
"JUDENSCWEIN TO THE OVENS ! -- LIARS ! --ALL OF YOU !" No, I don't
believe everything a user says, just because they say it.

> Not very but at least a little? ;-)

One of the reasons I think that groupthink probably has less truck
around Wikipedia than many other places is that: 1. we are all pretty
disconnected with each other, physically, nationally, politically,
etc. We share certain things, true, but the differences are pretty
stark. I don't have to tell someone to their face that I think they're
wrong when I type it in; it is pretty easy to disagree on here in
comparison with "real life". 2. there is little incentive. The only
incentive you've postulated is expediency. That's not much, especially
when it is easier to get that by just not participating. There is no
opportunity for improvement of my status by agreeing with others.
There is no real chance of punishment for disagreement. I agree where
I agree, I disagree where I disagree, and when I get tired of it I
take a break and go edit some articles or draw some pictures.

Which isn't to say that admins will generally tend to give other
admins the benefit of the doubt. But there are rational,
non-psychological reasons for that. Users could be anyone, but admins
have at least been approved by other Wikipedians. It's a very weak
form of accredation -- again, to consider admins a very homogenous
intellectual group, except perhaps by how they spend their leisure
time, seems incorrect to me, and the things which they all agree on,
the "systemic bias", generally don't come into play on these sorts of
disputes -- but it is more than you have with unknown users.

In my experience, most user complaints against admins are bogus. But
not ALL are. Even when knowing the former, we have to take care to
look out for the latter.

FF