[WikiEN-l] You're magically made an admin. What do you do?

[Mark Gallagher]

G'day Chris,

> Gallagher Mark George wrote:
> 
>> To be fair, it's not exactly poor judgment from admins --- well, it
>> is, but not entirely.  In my experience dealing with speedies, the
>> vast majority of improper speedies are articles that some CVUer
>> incorrectly tagged and the admin just speedied without looking,
>> trusting the CVUer's judgment.  Where an admin commits an improper
>> speedy off his own bat, it's usually something along the lines of
>> he judged that he didn't need to follow process in this case.
>> Incompetence vs IAR, in other words.
> 
> I usually do a fair bit of research before speedying anything.
> Google it, look at the page history, etc.  I delete far more than I
> remove tags -- in fact I rarely remove tags, unless the cited CSD
> clearly doesn't apply.

You should *always* look at the page history, "what links here", and the 
talkpage, to see if the speedy tag was added as a result of vandalism, 
is vandalism itself, or is simply a silly dispute (e.g. the fan of a 
rock band angry that an article about another rock band by the same name 
exists on Wikipedia).

> Why?  Because sometimes I half-agree with the tag, but don't think
> that the cited CSD is fully met by the article.  Maybe in spirit but
> not in letter.  So I just leave the article as it is, hoping another
> admin can come to a decision.
> 
> The fact is that C:CSD is full of BS pretty much all the time.  Any
> admin will tell you that clearing out CSD is pretty much hell.  For
> some reason this is not the case with WP:AIV.  There's usually a
> small backlog there, but it's a lot more fun to clean up, probably
> because there are fewer entries.  But I digress.

I know very well what CAT:CSD is like, thank you.  As I hinted in my 
other posts on the topic, a great deal of my work as an admin (as 
opposed to a concerned wikicitizen or whatever) was clearing out CSD 
backlogs.  Much of CAT:CSD is utter crap, but not nearly as much as 
should be.  The category *should be* "full of BS pretty much all the 
time".  If it's got worthwhile, or at the very least non-speediable, 
articles contained, then someone, somewhere, is fucking up badly.  And 
admins who delete such articles instead of removing the tag (maybe 
rebuking the CVUer who tagged it if a repeat offender) are doing the 
'pedia a disservice.

I don't think I ever left an article alone because I didn't want to be 
the one to make the decision to delete/not delete.  I *did* do this 
sometimes for articles that would have been too much work to deal with 
(e.g. copyvios with a note on the talkpage saying "I give permission for 
it to be used"), not because I was afraid of taking responsibility (not 
that there's anything wrong with that; as Tom said, someone else will 
happily pick up the slack), but because I had 200 more tagged articles 
to get through and I didn't want to waste half an hour checking the 
veracity of the user's assertion.

But when it came to a simple case of "is this speediable?", the way was 
clear.  As David Gerard and Tony Sideway have said (I paraphrase here): 
"If it's crap, kill it.  If it's not crap, don't."  Towards the end of 
my time as a regular editor (and hence, admin), at least half the 
articles tagged were either good in themselves, or easily salvageable 
with thirty seconds' work.  The other half I deleted.

I didn't agonise over, "is this technically a CSD?" --- if it obviously 
wasn't, then I removed the tag with a note in the page history.  If it 
was borderline but the article didn't suck completely, I'd remove the 
tag and say "take it to AfD".  If the article sucked, whether it met CSD 
exactly or not, bang it went.  Anyone who spotted a problem was free to 
ask me to review, or ask another admin the same, or take it to DRV (Tony 
Sideway, as I recall, got me to undelete a couple of articles where I'd 
acted too hastily), but these were quite rare, especially compared to 
some of my more modern colleagues.

Of course, once I became comfortable with Wikipedia, my philosophy 
became: "Do what seems Right, take a stand.  If you're wrong, then admit 
it and back down.  If you're right, keep on truckin'."  This is not 
something that everyone will, or should, follow comfortably.

> The fact is that admins clearing C:CSD are going to be more willing
> to push the button than remove the tag, because, well, pushing the
> button is less effort, and I would speculate (with no evidence at
> all) that the majority of CSD patrollers are deletionist, myself
> included.  I like to think that I have a clue, but sometimes I can't
> bring myself to push the button or remove the tag. I know it's drivel
> but we don't have a CSD for drivel that looks like it might make a
> shred of sense.

Pushing the button (delete the page, enter deletion reason, remove 
redlinks, remove talkpage) is less effort than removing the tag (remove 
tag, note talkpage if necessary)?

And deciding to abstain from admin action is not evidence of 
cluelessness: it's quite appropriate, even praiseworthy, behaviour.  If 
you can't make up your mind, feel free to pass on this one.  It's when 
you're out of your depth but act anyway that people get irritated, and 
quite rightly, too.

<snip />

> Many admins told me before my self-nom that admin work was mostly
> thankless grunt work.  In my limited experience, C:CSD is exactly
> what they were referring to.  You spend hours there to get almost
> nothing done, then get pissed on by both the authors and taggers of
> the articles you touched.

Oh, yes.  In my experience, the taggers were more abusive than the 
authors: "Excuse me, sir, why wasn't my article accepted on Wikipedia?" 
vs "Hey fuckwit, I'm a career vandal fighter, and you're not doing your 
job properly!"

The major source of stress when emptying CAT:CSD came from taggers, not 
authors.  The authors might be vandals, in which case they can be easily 
blocked; or drive-by, in which case they never even notice; or genuinely 
upset people who don't know what was wrong with their article, in which 
case I'm happy to explain; or genuinely upset people whose article I 
deleted mistakenly, in which case I'm happy to undo and apologise.

Taggers, on the other hand, tended to be fairly self-righteous.  "I'm a 
vandal-whacker, me!  And you're standing in the way of my whacking. 
Move aside, peasant!"  (I mean, of course, those who incorrectly tag 
worthwhile articles; I rarely correspond, for obvious reasons, with 
those who tag crap and get it deleted).

> Some admins may be reckless, but the majority are trying to sort the
> wheat from the chaff and make the occasional slip-up.  The more
> articles an admin deals with in this context the more mistakes he or
> she will make.  I'm not saying they should be given a free pass, but
> a little respect for all the BS they have to put up with wouldn't
> hurt.

Yeah, ah, *no*.  I was an admin.  If I get the time and inclination, I 
may apply to be one again.  I've seen first-hand the BS.  I've seen 
first-hand how much of the BS is part of the job (several metric 
truckloads), and how much is the result of simple incompetence (more 
than you'd think).

It wouldn't be accurate to say that there is a Right Way and a Wrong Way 
to be an administrator.  There are several Right Ways, several Wrong 
Ways, and it's not fair to criticise someone for following your (or my) 
particular favourite Right Way.  That said, an admin who chooses one of 
the Wrong Ways is in for a bollocking, and anyone who stands up and 
shouts, "Get a fucking clue!" before it gets any worse is doing him a 
favour.  He should realise this and adjust his behaviour accordingly, 
and not complain about the "BS" that bad admins cop, because baby, 
they've earned it.

But where's the line between pointing out bad behaviours (good), 
criticising good but ideologically incorrect behaviours (bad), and 
mindless abuse (very bad)?  If I knew that, you'd have to start calling 
me "Jimbo".


Cheers,

-- 
Mark Gallagher
"'Yes, sir,' said Jeeves in a low, cold voice, as if he had been bitten
in the leg by a personal friend."
- P G Wodehouse, /Carry On, Jeeves/