Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Zzuuzz 2

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

[edit] Zzuuzz

Final (42/1/1); Ended 03:28, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Zzuuzz (talk • contribs) - This user is yet another great user who would be an asset to the administrator community. He contributes strongly to all areas, and has improved since his last RfA, which may have passed if he didn't withdraw. He's great at vandalism-patrolling, he also contributes quality disussion to AfD, and he has improved his article-writing, which was the reason for most opposes last time. Definitely deserving of the tools. Wizardman 04:10, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here: I accept thanks. -- zzuuzz^(talk) 21:40, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Questions for the candidate

Dear candidate, thank you for offering to serve Wikipedia in this capacity. Please take the time to answer a few generic questions to provide guidance for participants:

1. What sysop chores do you anticipate helping with? Please check out Category:Wikipedia backlog and Category:Administrative backlog, and read the page about administrators and the administrators' reading list.

A: I will mostly use the sysop bit to help with the backlogs at AIV and CAT:SPEEDY. I have much experience of cleaning up vandalism which has given me a good idea who needs blocking to prevent further damage and who doesn't. I will probably also help with protection where appropriate, and I anticipate assisting in other areas with frequent backlogs such as copyvios and open proxies.

2. Of your articles or contributions to Wikipedia, are there any with which you are particularly pleased, and why?

A: I am pleased with all the contributions I have made to cleaning up Wikipedia, improving its quality, and helping others improve their contributions.

A2: In light of some requests, I will try and expand this answer. I've improved thousands of different articles and I'm pleased with just about all of it. I don't really focus on improving the coverage of subject x or topic y, or adding significant text to any particular article. I prefer to focus instead on introducing elementary encyclopaedic standards across a broad range of articles. There are many articles I revisit of course, and slowly improve over time. The list of articles I have edited most (as mentioned below) contains some of the following... I help a bit with the MySpace article, both in the article and the talk page. The article is a magnet for vandalism and original research. But I can't take too much credit for that. I help to maintain the List of Internet slang phrases which is one of the most-edited and best-referenced articles on Wikipedia, though you will either love it or hate it (or try and transwiki it). The List of London School of Economics people is another list I have edited frequently, along with quite a few of its sub-articles. The United Kingdom, England, and London articles get their share of vandalism removed by me, but I have also improved them in some other ways. I have also helped a fair bit with CAT:NOCAT and Category:Lists, as well as numerous articles within Category:United Kingdom and its sub-categories. My article creations include the notable Clara Furse and the significant Sandy Gall. I will also take credit for rescuing Ray Moore (broadcaster) recently, and I have created an article for Roncq which still needs a bit of work before it reaches featured standard. I've removed libel from literally hundreds of articles, especially but not exclusively from school articles, several hundred of which I have been helping to clean up over the last few months. I've removed a further load of copyvios, hoaxes, spam, vanity, abuse, and fake deterrent protection templates which were all quite embarrassing to the encyclopaedia. My favourite AfD recently was Fecal vomiting which was headed quickly for a rather unpleasant end before I contributed. I also take a small amount of credit (rightly or wrongly, probably wrongly) for the first eight words of the Northern Ireland article, which are now stable following an extensive debate about them into which I interjected. I have contributed significantly to our knowledge of which statistics we lack about English people, and for that matter, Irish people, Cornish people, and perhaps also to some extent Asian (people). I contributed stability to the year of establishment of the term chav, and I have added some good references to the article about Wanker. I have also been active at the Help Desk and at the other end of the {{helpme}} tag, assisting many other editors with their questions and problems to help them contribute what they can. I help a fair bit with new pages and new users in a similar vein, and I obviously assist to quite a large extent in the effort to help vandals find the right path. These are a few of the various things I have worked on, and I take pleasure in it and credit for it to varying degrees.

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 really get into conflicts over editing. I generally only add material that is well referenced and NPOV, and I find this is a good ingredient to prevent and even resolve conflicts. If there are disagreements of opinion or fact then I will normally open or join a discourse and attempt to negotiate a suitable narrative within the editorial guidelines.

Optional question (or questions) from —— Eagle101 ^{Need help?}

4. Spam has almost doubled in little over 2 months. This information was derived from watching Linkwatcher's (IRC bot, created by me) output as it sits in #wikipedia-spam, a channel on the freenode IRC network. The core policies and guidelines dealing with spam are WP:SPAM, WP:EL, and WP:RS. An open ended question, what is your view on how severe spam is, and why? What is the purpose of External Links? Should we be allowing every myspace, youtube, blogspot, ect links into Wikipedia, Or should our standards be a bit higher then that? Some useful stats that have been collected recently are Veinor's stats on which domains are being added daily, and Heligoland's stats on frequency of link insertion. All stats are derived from LinkWatcher (IRC bot) logs. You can have a look at the full counter spam efforts on meta at m:User:Eagle 101/Spam.

A: Spam is indeed a growing problem, not only in the traditional problem articles like Insurance, and Mesothelioma, but we are also seeing more and more quite large-scale SEO campaigns to spam all over the wiki. The scale of it can be quite staggering. It seems like we are slowly getting better at finding it, but it is an ever-increasing firehose, and I think we will end up with more technical solutions to keep it at bay. You mentioned the linkwatcher bot. Although I think the linkwatcher bots(s) are the greatest thing since sliced bread, it's my experience that many of the links that the bot identifies are false positives for spam, ie a lot of links are properly being added as reliable sources (which I generally applaud). What is the point of external links? They provide further information beyond what we can provide. In most cases they are for references, but they can also serve to provide other reliable sources of further information once you've reached the end of the article. Just like with our references we should make sure our external links are highly relevant and reliable, and that rarely includes blogs, MySpace, YouTube, or www.seocopyvioarticlesaffiliate.com. However I see no reason not to have a MySpace link in a notable band's article, in addition to the references.

Optional question from llywrch

5. Can you imagine yourself deciding ever taking a day off from Admin duties? Just deciding to let someone else worry about the vandals, troublemakers, and personality disputes in order to spend that entire day simply improving Wikipedia's content? -- llywrch 04:13, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Optional question from Dionyseus

6. If a user makes a very nasty personal attack, should the user be punished with a block? Dionyseus 05:46, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

A Blocks are not used for punishment.

General comments

• See Zzuuzz's edit summary usage with mathbot's tool. For the edit count, see the talk page.

Discussion

Support

1. Support as nom.--Wizardman 21:44, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
2. Support I'll echo that--Hu12 21:53, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
3. Support - opposes six months ago were all for editcountitis - looks like a great candidate who would have made a great admin then and will make a great admin now. --BigDT 22:08, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

   That's not entirely true. Discounting editcountitis, and {{shrubbery}}s like 1FA, there were a number of other points raised: "unhappy with the level of meaningful contributions"; "not enough quality encyclopedic content edits"; "would like to see more experience actually building [the project] up as well". The answer to Q2 is less than forthcoming in regard to these sorts of concerns. Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:41, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

4. Weak support - can't find anything to complain about, but can't see too much requirement for the tools. However, since it's no big deal, I won't stand in the way, and wish Zzuuzz all the best. The Rambling Man 22:19, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

   I disagree with the no big deal comment, there have been cases in which administrators have abused their power and have caused damage to the community, I think deciding on whether to give someone the power to block editors is a big deal and should be taken seriously. Dionyseus 05:23, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

5. Support Plenty of vandal rollbacks and associated warnings, with persistent offenders reported to WP:AIV too. I can't see any signs of uncivil behaviour or massive policy breaches, so I don't believe that the admin tools will be abused by this editor. (aeropagitica) 23:05, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
6. Hrm, thought he was already an admin Support Seriously, I've seen Zzuuzz all over Wikipedia and he does good work gaillimh^{Conas tá tú?} 23:21, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
7. Support per the reason I had when I supported your first RfA. No, but seriously, Zzuuzz has improved on the problems from the last RfA, and I feel he has demonstrated to us that he is fully capable of using the admin tools. Nishkid64 23:42, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
8. Support -- I appreciate his work helping to keep some of the insurance articles spam-free despite daily spam raids. Thanks for serving. --A. B. ^(talk) 00:18, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
9. Support I was happy to support last time and sorry to see the candidate withdraw. Good luck this time! Agent 86 00:37, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
10. Support Looks good to me. ⇒ SWATJester ^{On Belay!} 01:38, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
11. Support. Wizardman's been hunting good admin candidates :). Yuser31415 (Editor review two!) 01:55, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
12. Support -- Semperf 03:09, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
13. Support I've seen this user many times, seems like he'd make a good admin.--Húsönd 03:30, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
14. Support. Cbrown1023 talk 03:46, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
15. Support, as five months hither. Joe 06:07, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
16. Jorcoga ^(Hi!/Review)07:29, Sunday, 11 February '07
17. Support per Nom. --MoRsE 10:28, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
18. Support devoted contributors make good admins. 12K+ edits in the mainspace is quite an impressive number. Even if the every single contribution was not big then the sheer number of them shows strong devotion to the project Alex Bakharev 10:34, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
19. Support user does good work, seems like a great candidate. - Anas ^Talk? 12:01, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
20. I'm Mailer Diablo and I approve this message! - 14:20, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
21. Terence Ong 15:26, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
22. Support Sheesh, he's more than qualified. No offense to trialsanderrors, but his reason to oppose was a bit petty in my opinion; question two is not even that important. -- P.B. Pilhet / ☎ 15:38, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
23. Support - from Essjay's edit counter, I see that despite a brief answer to Q2 he has made significant contributions to a number of articles, so he isn't 'just' a vandal fighter. Also, he has edited WP:AIV over a 100 times, which is usually a good sign, especially considering his answer to Q1. Overall, if someone hasn't been involved in editing (instead of reverting) the encyclopedia that would be a valid reason for me to oppose. However, I won't oppose purely on the grounds his answer to Q2 is slightly shorter than optimum. Addhoc 18:37, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
24. Contributions history presents no concerns, issues raised by opposition are completely trivial. Christopher Parham (talk) 19:20, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
25. Support. Thanks for keeping your answers short and focused. YechielMan 20:30, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
26. Support, always keeps a level head and patiently deals with the blowback from his mopping efforts; has only improved since his last RFA. Kuru ^talk 21:18, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

    (nods head) Jorcoga ^(Hi!/Review)09:42, Monday, 12 February '07 Already supported, see #16.

27. Zzupport. I kill me. Proto::► 11:51, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
28. Support Good candidate. Won't abuse admin tools. --Aude (talk) 00:50, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
29. Support looks like a good editor.-- danntm ^T _C 02:48, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
30. Support per nom. Good contributor. utcursch | talk 11:58, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
31. Support a good candidate --Steve _(Slf67) ^talk 22:50, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
32. Support Originally opposed, but candidate certainly improved his answers to the questions, and I'm satisfied by the answers. Dionyseus 12:45, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
33. Support Replies to optional questions seem up to par. Sure he could have done a better job at the start with the questions, but the questions are not everything, there is a human being behind that account. Its that human being that I trust, his contributions seem to yield no problems. Therefore take that mop and do good things with it. —— Eagle101 ^{Need help?} 20:48, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
34. Support--Wikipedier (talk • contribs) 03:19, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
35. Support. --Slgrandson (page - messages - contribs) 20:57, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
36. Support John254 05:04, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
37. Support, understands Wikipedia's policies. I do not seek any problem having mop. Shyam ^(T/C) 06:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

    Support per nom. utcursch | talk 15:08, 16 February 2007 (UTC) Double vote, see #30.

38. Support. SynergeticMaggot 18:05, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
39. Support. G.He 05:06, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
40. Support —Quarl ^(talk) 2007-02-17 12:38Z
41. Support per nom and answers — Lost^(talk) 13:06, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
42. Support No reason to believe user will abuse the tools. IronDuke 22:14, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Oppose Please keep criticism constructive and polite.

Oppose the answer for question two is poor, i still see a lack of article writing since last rfa which is key for me Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 07:00, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

No vote Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 00:30, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Oppose Q2. ~ trialsanderrors 08:30, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Switched to no vote. ~ trialsanderrors 21:30, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I asked zzuuzz to expand on Q2 so keep an eye out for that.--Wizardman 21:46, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Oppose per Jaranda, i'd actually say it's an extremely poor answer to the question. Dionyseus 22:49, 13 February 2007 (UTC) switched to support

1. Oppose • I, for one, do have a problem with Myspace links. It's called verifiability. If a potential admin doesn't even have a grasp of such a fundamental Wikipedia policy, then I cannot and will not support them. ✎ Peter M Dodge (Talk to Me) 21:34, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

   Thank you for your comment. I just wish to point out that I mentioned a MySpace link might be added "in addition to the references". When I said I applauded editors adding reliable sources, I was not referring to MySpace links. -- zzuuzz^(talk) 22:02, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Neutral

Neutral based on questions 2 and 3. Answers sound a tad too self-satisfied and simple for my taste. —Kncyu38 (talk • contribs) 16:11, 11 February 2007 (UTC) Change to abstention from voting. —KNcyu38 (talk • contribs) 06:37, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

1. Neutral hoping for a more complete answer to question 2. I'm not convinced that someone who really has done substantive content writing would give such a 'I'm happy with everything!' hand-waving answer. Opabinia regalis 21:59, 11 February 2007 (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.