User:Ilaro/RfA

Request for Adminship: Ilaro

Ilaro (talk⁺ • contribs • edit count • logs • email)

I have been thinking for some time to write an RfA, but I am not a native speaker and feel like I can make some quite bad grammar mistakes. However, I am finally confident enough that my contributions as admin will strongly benefit the site. I have been part of UESP for more than 7 years, but only became an active editor in mid-2017. After a couple of months, I nominated myself for patrollership and since that time I have been an active patroller. I am also a blocker and used it on several occasions to fight spam and vandalism.

As an editor, I am almost exclusively active in Legendspace (>80% of my edits), although I do not mind fixing typos and formatting issues in other namespaces. I intend to document Blades when it gets released on PC, but there is still no release date announced. My edits are not limited to documentation, but include formatting, uploading image and audio files, adding and updating templates, making image maps, and even editing MediaWiki on rare occasions (see my sandboxes for some of the other projects I work on). I am experienced with wiki syntax and several extensions (tables, templates, magic words, flowcharts, and more) and can find my way in HTML.

Besides the standard wiki duties, I also maintain Legends Card Data (or request Dave to update it), moderate the Discord, perform datamining to get Legends files, and have had contact with community managers and developers from Bethesda/Sparkypants.

Questions

Feel free to add more questions below.

Q1: What do you hope to accomplish as an administrator?

A: As the Elsweyr expansion is almost released and the updates for ESO are not slowing down anytime soon, there is a precedent for admins to work on this most active namespace. However, there are also 3 new expansions announced for Legends and there will be several updates for Blades in the near future. With my admin rights, I hope to remove most of the pressure from these namespaces (especially Legends) so other admins can focus on other important tasks of the site. Furthermore, as I am not limited to use the tools for a specific namespace, I will keep a lookout for dealing with spam, disputes, protecting pages, etc on other parts of the site.

Q2: What do you see as the UESP's main challenges in the near future?

A: Staying relevant. While all the old info won't be gone all of a sudden, the problem is with the new games. Everyone tries to setup their own sites. Look at all the sites ESO, Legends, and Blades spawned. I think this is mostly because of *1: we are not a community site, but focussed on info documentation. *2: In this age of the internet people want to have their own site and credit to their name. We are slowly starting to lag behind while the documentation is getting fractured all over the internet. One of my priorities is UESP's accessibility. Things like easy to use templates with documentation on how to use them, clearly colored and labelled tables, no convoluted and ambiguously written articles, etc. Sometimes this will be at the expense of something like lore in the game namespaces. However, we first need to attract people to read the page. The more people read them, the more will help with editing and filling in missing content.

Q3: How do you interpret the balance between enforcing policies and being innovative when policies prove to be problematic?

A: I'd like to say that I am really strict with the guidelines and policies concerning conduct and enforcement. I have spent a lot of time reading policies on UESP and Wikipedia alike. However, we are not Wikipedia and if rules need to be changed to reflect that, then they should be. Compromise is key. However, I'm rather lax in following formatting guides. If the page benefits from a better lay-out then I'll just do that. In the end, one of the most important guidelines is "be bold".

Q4: What action will you take if you see another administrator perform an action that you completely disagree with? Do you believe it is ever necessary or permissible to revert the actions of another administrator?

A: When an admin is not performing an action that is considered an admin duty (like a normal edit), then I will treat it like any other edit from a regular user. If an admin is performing an action that is against a policy, I will make them aware of it. Depending of the action, a rollback might be necessary, but (again) compromise is key. However, this does mean that the policy has to be changed to reflect the ability to perform that action. If it is more drastic than that, like disregarding important policies and guidelines with no discussion, further steps might be needed. Adminship is a privilege and not a right. Even after they are promoted. Any time an admin gets away with disregarding policy, a regular user may feel they should be able to do that too with less retribution. Admins should be the example for other users.

There might be other cases where I disagree with a certain action, but as long as there is a consensus in favour of this action, I won't take any steps to revert any of it (except for maybe trying to change the policy).

I don't think there are many other scenarios where I would disagree with another admin.

Votes

All registered users are welcome to vote Support, Neutral, or Opposed. Comments are also welcome.

• Support: Ilaro has been the #1 person for getting our Legends space up to par, and has done an incredible amount of template writing and editing, organization, communication with devs and other community leaders, and datamining. He's also been a very diligent blocker and patroller. I have no doubt that he will continue to make great contributions, and being an admin would make the job of wrangling the Legends space (as new updates constantly come in) easier. --FioFioFio (talk) 16:02, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
• Comment: This is just a reminder that anyone with an account can vote. (And in case anyone's wondering why I'm posting this when I haven't yet voted myself, administrators often delay their votes until others have done so, so as not to potentially influence the outcome.) – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 15:40, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
• Neutral: I don't want to be that one person who outright opposes the vote, and don't take it personally, but I'm not 100% convinced we need Ilaro's services as an admin. That's not to say he doesn't deserve it or shouldn't have it, but that he doesn't necessarily have what I personally see as the experience to be an administrator. Point me to it if it is in fact there, but I see an editor who hasn't done a whole lot as far as actually interacting with the community from a position of authority as a staff member, be that issuing blocks (there are a whopping 8 or 9 in the log for blocking robo-spammers) and I haven't come across anything as a reference point for how he interacts in talk pages when issuing warnings, mentoring, coaching, or whatever you want to call politely talking to and interacting with other users on a more personal one-on-one basis, and what have you, outside of AN/CP group discussions. In a larger community like Wikipedia where they need a lot of admins who just push buttons, Ilaro would be great for the job, but for a smaller community like us, we need someone equally comfortable with personal interactions, because he'd be one of only a handful of still-active administrators and that role would put him in a lot of "moderating" positions that are in a different ballpark than what being one of an even larger pool of Discord moderators would experience.

I'm sure he can press the admin buttons just fine to do maintenance work, but admins are the, for lack of a better word, personification and face to the UESP community, and it's something he either hasn't done much of or I just haven't seen it. I can responsibly perform maintenance edits, but I'm not a good talker or face for the community if I had an admin ribbon, for instance, and I don't see administrative rights as so essentially crucial that he absolutely needs to have it when we have a fair few administrators who can already do the work load adequately. That's why I don't feel like it would be fair to outright oppose the vote, but at the same time I can't bring myself to feeling strongly enough to support it. Nothing personal, man, but if you disagree with something I said or can find instances you can use to swing my opinion about stuff I've said, I'd be happy to receive it and consider changing off my neutral position in one direction or the other. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 04:53, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

Thank you Damon, I don't take it personal at all. I am mostly glad you voiced your concerns as they are all valid points about admin rights.

Let me first try to tackle the easy ones. Our spam filter is doing a incredible job, because there only have been 86 blocks (discounting block extensions) in the Block log since I got my blocking permissions (you can see me testing it on August 13). This means that with my 8/9 blocks, I am actually at a whopping 10% of all blocks on the wiki since that time. So while I agree that it isn't much, there just hasn't been the opportunity to perform these kind of actions. This is just to demonstrate a point, but I am afraid to say this noticeable all across the wiki. When looking at talk page interactions, CP and AN discussions, mentoring, issue warnings, etc. there is a very steep downward trend in activity. For some of them it can arguably be said that it's a good thing, but for others not so much. And I think this does touch on another problem: communication is going offsite. Most new active editors are not communicating their ideas, efforts, and projects on the wiki anymore, but the discussions are held in places like Discord. This is a real concern, as any binding decision should still be made on the wiki, but this does mean that most coaching (and also conflicts) are resolved somewhere else (like asking questions about templates or help with images). I am just as guilty in this as many other users, but this does not mean I didn't help with coaching and fixing mistakes. Jeancey is actually pulling some of his comments to talk pages right now, which is in my opinion a good development and something I did more often (1, 2) in the past. I also spearheaded the nomination for another patroller and campaigned (sadly mostly offsite, but you can read some of my old concerns in the autopatroller nomination here) for the reduction of unpatrolled edits.

So to quickly summarize, I have not been completely silent in these issues, but I agree that I have to be more proactive about it on-wiki. Of course, this might not convince you of my capabilities for adminship, but I'm glad you voiced you concerns. However, I do believe these concerns are not per se rooted in my request for adminship, but about a larger issue stemming from the way of communication across the whole platform of UESP. I hope this answers most of your points, although I can see why they would not be satisfactory from your point of view. --Ilaro (talk) 09:26, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support: Perhaps you are more active on Discord than I'm aware of. I'm unleveled by choice and miss a lot of secret action in leveled rooms and don't want many game-specific channels or wiki-discussion. I do like your response about communication going off-site as opposed to being on the wiki. It was very thoughtful and well worded, and your awareness and responses to this post and your answers to the others make me optimistic about you having a good run as an administrator. I'd be more than happy to give you full support. -damon  ^{talk ♥ contribs} 22:37, 29 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support: Ilaro is a fantastic editor and coordinator; bearing much of the responsibility for the Legends namespace being as wonderful as it is presently, and his engagement with the Legends community and developers have greatly boosted UESP's reputation within the community. He is a very diligent patroller, experienced with templates and other tools, and I've noted he's often to be seen assisting users on Discord with questions about the wiki and editing in general. Ilaro is a personable, mature, and dedicated individual, and would be nothing but a valued addition to the administrative team. Vyraesi (talk) 23:41, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support: Ilaro has a good balance of qualities for UESP as a whole. Lots of great and essential editing on the wiki, moderating the Discord, and communicating with the Legends developers on our behalf. While I agree with Damon that there isn't exactly a need for more admins, there isn't an overabundance either and Ilaro would greatly benefit from moving without redirect/deleting files even if he did nothing else with the role. From my experience though, he is exactly the kind of person to excel at the community leader and role model aspect of adminship. I second Vyraesi's three adjectives - personable, mature, and dedicated - I can't think of a better description. —Dillonn241 (talk) 02:06, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support: If I'm allowed to vote, I'd like to express my support as well. I'm not as active here as I would like to be, but based on the experiences I have had with Ilaro in the past, I can say with confidence that he exemplifies the qualities befitting of an administrator. He is agreeable, rational, thoughtful, and kind; he's a skilled coordinator and communicator, and spends his fair share of time interacting with community members on the Discord server. From time to time, I have seen him giving input on matters brought up in the TESWiki server as well, outreach that I really appreciate. I think that Ilaro truly does care about the UESP and its community, and for that reason I would be happy to see him as an admin. —Atvelonis (talk) 20:24, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

  Comment: Like I said above, anyone with an account can vote. Under some circumstances, we might discount a newly created account or one with no significant edit history, but you've been active enough here that I don't think anyone would question your right to vote, even if UESP isn't your primary wiki. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 23:32, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support: Ilaro has shown a consistent history of being helpful to other users on Discord, willing to take on both small edits and large projects (read: the entire Legends namespace), and is knowledgeable about technical issues as well. I look forward to having him on the admin team. – Robin Hood  ^(talk) 23:32, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

Consensus: Support. Fully supported by all participants. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 16:15, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Done! -- Daveh ^(talk) 12:49, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

Addendum

Just some comments from my side. Thanks everyone for voting! Maybe I'm a bit vain or just insecure, but I'd like to include the following image to solidify the vote for historical purposes: Discord support after closure of the RfA. Maybe I didn't promote it enough, afraid of influencing the vote, or maybe it was just closed a bit too early. Either way, I'm glad I could join our team of admins! --Ilaro (talk) 23:23, 8 June 2019 (UTC)