Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Ross Hill

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

Ross Hill

Final (0/5/1); ended 00:37, 10 October 2013 (UTC) - Withdrawn — Ross Hill 00:37, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Nomination

Ross Hill (talk · contribs) – Throughout my Wikipedia career, I've largely done "behind the scenes" work, like answering questions, fighting vandalism, and training others to fight vandalism. I have not done a very large amount of mainspace work. However, I personally think that content creation is irrelevant to adminship. Admin tools such as Blocking, page protection, and closing disputes have very little to do with one's experience in the main space, so long as the administrator has a sound understanding of article policies. My goal would be to eliminate the administrative backlog if I become an administrator. As such, I think I will be a net positive to the project. — Ross Hill 21:41, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia as an administrator. Please answer these questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. What administrative work do you intend to take part in?

A: As I said above, my primary goal will be to eliminate the administrative backlog whenever possible. I would initially focus on: WP:AIV, WP:RPP, C:CSD, WP:PERM, and finally, WP:ANRFC.

2. What are your best contributions to Wikipedia, and why?

A: My best contributions have been WP:Wikignome work, and counter vandalism.

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 don't recall ever having been caused stress by other editors. I've usually managed to keep discussions constructive. If I face conflicts I will keep a cool head, and remove myself from the discussion should keeping cool become too difficult.

General comments

• Links for Ross Hill: Ross Hill (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)
• Edit summary usage for Ross Hill can be found here.

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Please keep discussion constructive and civil. If you are unfamiliar with the nominee, please thoroughly review his contributions before commenting.

Discussion

Oppose

1. Oppose - Seeing as you have less than 5k edits and have been here less than a year, I will have to oppose. With best wishes, allow me to suggest another 6-12 months of editing experience at your current rate. Also suggest a broader range of editing, including content. Jusdafax 23:51, 9 October 2013 (UTC)
2. Oppose - "However, I personally think that content creation is irrelevant to adminship." I don't expect all admins to be prolific content contributors, and I have supported several candidates whose areas of focus were bots, or some other task like that. But taking such a firm stance in this way doesn't sit well with me, I'm afraid... as content contribution is really the best way to demonstrate an adequate knowledge of our content policies, and admins not knowing the policies well has led to problems in the past. --Rschen7754 23:57, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

   Hi Rschen7754, I hadn't meant that content creation inhibits admin capabilities. In fact, most of our admins are content creators. I simply meant that adminship is a group of tools (blocking, deleting, closing, etc.) that does not count upon thousands of mainspace edits to understand. I said that as long as an admin has a great understanding of article policies, a high mainspace edit count is irrelevant. I'm happy to answer any questions to show that I know article policies. — Ross Hill 00:03, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

3. Oppose. Nom and Q1-Q3 are slightly off. Article < 1K edits and poor distribution. Content disputes are different from vandalism and are better indication of demeanor. Has not opted in, so there's too little condensed data for AIV. CSD log? AfD has only two entries. I need to see more experience. Glrx (talk) 00:13, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
4. Oppose Although most admin work falls outside of content creation, for admins there's no way to avoid eventually dealing with Wikipedia's primary purpose: articles. Content creation, although indirectly, helps make you a more well-rounded and understanding user. I would like to see a "redder pie" with more article contributions, and maybe a DYK or GA. ~HueSatLum 00:15, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
5. Oppose I was about to quote the exact same sentence. Many policies, such as WP:BLP, require knowledge of content policies to implement. How do you know a negative claim is weakly sourced if you can't tell the difference between a tabloid and a legitimate news source? Vandalism patrol might not require knowledge of content work, but there is more to adminship than firing phasers at the Klingons. Can't support. Edit count is immaterial, btw.--v/r - TP 00:16, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Neutral

1. Neutral I like the user's effort, attitude, and civility but he needs more experience with content (esp. since he intends to close discussions, and because as an admin he will need to deal with not only vandals, but also tendentious editors, POV pushers etc) and content policies. For example: Ross has participated in two AFDs so far, nominating Aid station and Racism in France for deletion. In both cases all the !votes were against deletion and the articles were kept, with early AFD closures. I would recommend that Ross withdraw the RFA for now, but try again next year since all the issues that I and others have pointed out are remediable with greater experience. Abecedare (talk) 00:31, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

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.