Critical issues presentations/Fixing RfA on English Wikipedia

Submission no. 6

Title of the submission

Fixing RfA on English Wikipedia

Author of the submission

• Rudra Pratap Sinha

Country of origin

India

Topics

Governance, Policy, Projects

Keywords

• Adminship
• English Wikipedia problems
• Adminship reform

Abstract

This presentation is primarily on one of the most heated topics of English Wikipedia - adminship. It is long been argued that request for adminship is a broken process on English Wikipedia, even Mr. Jimmy Wales once have noted. This topic is in the center of one of the biggest online debates on Wikipedia, as can be seen in the following discussions: this, this and in the archives of WT:RfA.

The problem: Many editors agree that there is something wrong with RfA. Some users have explicitly stated that they are afraid of doing so, for one reason or another. Most of the time, it seems to be related to alleged high standards or an unpleasant environment. However, different users have different ideas. Some users emphasize that we must fix the aforementioned high standards and/or hostile environment. Some point out that RfA could be easier to pass if it was not difficult to desysop troublesome admins. Others advocate unbundling the tools. And then comes the issue of finding solutions to these problems. Although there is admittedly very little precedent for success in RfA reform, the purpose of this presentation is to identify the problems with RfA and reach a solution as to how those problems can be fixed. Nothing will ever happen if we don't persistently try to fix the process; otherwise, we might as well shut down WT:RFA, since all discussion would be pointless. This problems are currently in discussion but I feel offline discussion is needed among the English Wikipedia community to address the problem more efficiently.

Result

Not accepted