Talk:Stewards/Archive 3

Discussion continues

Discussion related to 2007 election moved to Talk:Stewards/elections_2007. Majorly (talk) 16:52, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the refactor there, it was getting big. :) ++Lar: t/c 16:54, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

The list

see Stewards#List of stewards ... what do the numbers (first column) mean? They seem to be almost the same as the alphabetical order of the names, except for a few names, and almost the same order as the userids, again except for a few. Anyone remember? ++Lar: t/c 20:06, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

All this time I thought it was set out Alphabetically and chronologically :O ....--Cometstyles 21:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I hope someone knows. Because if we can't suss out what it's for maybe we should ditch it? ++Lar: t/c 23:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

The chart

I updated the chart. It does NOT take the results of confirmations into effect. Old and new stewards need to reach consensus on which stewards are confirmed or not, and at that point some tweaks can be done. I know we had at least one steward who already indicated desire not to go forward but probably best to do all the confirmation changes as a body. ++Lar: t/c 23:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

new stewards december 2007

Can somebody add the new stewards?

As I can see from here it are the persons listed below. Thanks, Ellywa 12:32, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

.anaconda Andre Engels Dungodung Jusjih Lar Millosh Spacebirdy Thogo Wpedzich Zirland DerHexer Nick1915

Hi... where would you like to see them added? They have been added to Stewards#List_of_stewards and Stewards#Chart already. Thanks! ++Lar: t/c 18:40, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Oké, I see, only Andre Engels is missing, I will add him myself then. Ellywa 22:16, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

He is there, you find him quite at the top of the chart, since he already was a steward some years ago. --Thogo (talk) 22:40, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Policies

Steward policies overhaul

I've sandboxed an overhauled version of the steward policies (diff). Please see Talk:Steward policies#Overhaul for discussion and a summary of changes. —{admin} Pathoschild 06:04, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Proposed security policy

Please see en:Wikipedia:Security for a proposed policy that may have ramifications for stewards discovered to have weak passwords. I'm uncertain how this will affect stewards, since Meta policy isn't English policy, but I definitely think that in principle the policy should be heeded by all stewards, who (since they're sometimes called in to perform emergency desysoppings) must be more aware than most of the potential for abuse of privileged accounts. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 15:57, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

English Wikipedia policy does not apply to stewards (not even in principle), although some are locally subject to it as English Wikipedia editors. Further, that policy looks more like a help page than a policy; it explains passwords and their importance, describes current security measures, and offers plenty of suggestions and "tips", but it doesn't actually codify anything.

I do agree that stewards (and everyone else) should have strong passwords, though. —{admin} Pathoschild 02:42:07, 08 May 2007 (UTC)

Just as a note to this, Brion Vibber is now running a server-side password cracker, which has already run on enwiki, and I believe he will be running it on all wikis as well. As such, stewards with weak passwords (of which I certainly hope there are none) will be found out. Unfortunately, forcing stewards and others to have strong passwords is difficult to codify with policy, though hopefully this will soon be done technically. In any case, it may be a good idea to spread the word to all stewards, admins, and crats on meta that they should change their passwords if they think they may be weak. AmiDaniel 05:14, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Helping projects without community

Policy on projects without activity or community. Cary Bass ^demandez 10:56, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

If there are any contributors at all and they appear reasonable, promote a pair (similar to checkuser, that way they can monitor each other) and allow them to attempt to build activity and community. If there is actually zero activity, there are no people who have standing to complain about stewards doing needed tasks on the project.

I'd suggest that if there are no significant contributions to a project within a three month time (that is, other than vandalism, bots, and userpage activity) that the stewards be free to maintain the project as they see fit. ~Kylu (u|t) 05:19, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Seems eminently reasonable to me, as a non steward. We presumably would like to avoid repeats of the goldfarming management episode (some obscure language wiki was being used to manage an online gaming guild or some such thing, IIRC without even anyone being a sysop) so keeping at least a sporadic eye on temporaries and on the wiki activities is good... 3 months seems the guideline for temporary sysopping and there is no reason to change that, in my view. ++Lar: t/c 13:29, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

New stewards (needed)

Needed steward for South Slavic issues

From time to time I realize that we need (at least) one steward to deal with our local issues. The last incident is related to impersonation of one admin from Croatian Wikipedia (w:hr:User:Roberta F.) on Serbo-Croatian Wikipedia and Wiktionary (at least there, we didn't investigate more). Only Wikipedias (and not all of them) have checkusers and it is hard to make fast investigation without a steward from this region. So, I propose myself for stewardship for this issues (I am bureaucrat on all Serbian projects except on Wikipedia and on Serbo-Croatian Wiktionary, as well as I am admin here, on Meta; I was checkuser on Serbian Wikipedia, but I resigned from the position). However, it would be also perfect if some of other well known people from this region would become stewards (like Dungodung, Romanm or SpeedyGonsales). I see that last election was at December 2006; and I am not completely sure what is needed to do next... --Millosh 06:30, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

New stewards are selected following full Wikimedia elections, which are only held when new stewards are needed on a general basis. All you can do is wait until the next election, which I suspect will occur sometime before this month next year. However, the steward policies prohibit the use of steward tools on a project where you are active. —{admin} Pathoschild 16:25:31, 09 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for info. I think that policy which forbids being active on some project is not so useful, even I fully understand why it is so. Because of such policy, for example, only this region will need three stewards... It is much more easy to communicate with a person who is familiar with the situation then with someone who is not. Even I am not active presently on local wikis (my present plans are to be active only on sh.wikt), being steward means that I wouldn't be able to be active on any of project on which I may give some significant input (in the most cases generating articles about places and similar with bots). And, unlikely with languages with much bigger number of speakers, we don't have such number of persons who are willing not to be active. Whatever... I just wanted to say that because I think that it is a problem related not only to our region. --Millosh 21:05, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

• Stewards can use and have been using the checkuser tool in their home projects. Hillgentleman 23:27, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Stewards/Application_guidelines probably needs updating

Per Steward_policies#Processes typically elections and confirmations are held yearly. This page refers to the process for last year's election. Is it time to start working on the process and pages for this year's election? Has that work already gotten underway? Similarly, Stewards/confirm probably also needs updating. I am interested in this topic, naturally, (as it is fairly common knowledge that I intend to stand again this year) but am not sure it is appropriate that I work directly, however I can presumably help with some of the mechanics/documentation. I suspect there is no reason to change the process, just create and update the appropriate texts. If work is underway please point me at it, thanks. ++Lar: t/c 14:58, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Typically so they say... :) Well, I agree it would be appropriate to hold elections yearly. Whether it's really necessary is another question. Are there many steward backlogs, and/or do the current most active stewards feel under pressure? I don't know the answers to these questions. Last year, I do believe the elections were brought up simply by suggesting it on a talk page, and there being general agreement that it would be a good idea. Btw, I don't think it really matters that you work with it and stand - last year Redux brought it up and ran, so it won't be a problem, just how you feel I suppose. So the question, should we have some elections? If so, when? Majorly (talk) 15:27, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

It seems to be that time of year again. I do not think this month is the optimal time.... but December perhaps? Mid-December? I think we should hold these elections sometime around then. --Anonymous Dissident^Talk 23:05, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

The disadvantage of December is that it will clash with the elections for the English Wikipedia Arbitraion Committee. Angela 23:59, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Were they not at the same time last year? Majorly (talk) 00:19, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think the steward elections should not be dependent on dates of other elections. To vote for (or against) a couple of people doesn't need that much time that it would be a real clash if steward elections and arbcom elections are held parallelly. But the end of December might bring the problem that many people are on holidays then... ;o) So why not in the first weeks of December? Btw., the German Wikipedia has arbcom elections in November. :p --Thogo (talk) 01:16, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, we would probably like to announce the steward elections globally, so the Fundraiser notice would clash too, wouldn't it? But otherwise, I think a steward election in late-December would be great. :-) Cbrown1023 talk 15:57, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

• Stewards are the least relevant to the English Wikipedians, who have the support of bureaucrats, mediators, arbitrators, checkusers, and board members (e.g. the chair recently used the checkuser tool on the English wikipedia) :-). -Hillgentleman 18:04, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

The elections were more or less at the same time last year as the en:wp arbcom elections, as I recall. The Steward elections finished first, winding up well before Jan 1, but definitely had some overlap in timing, as I recall. I don't think that caused any major issues. I think having them at the same time again, more or less, this year makes a fair bit of sense. I do think Hillgentleman has a point, about the only thing stewards have to do for en:wp is remove permissions (and perhaps occasionally do a cross wiki CU). If one looks for a time when there are no overlaps at all with anything, I suspect one will never find such a time, so there is argument for going with precendent. At this point I think there is time to do the things that need doing if the consensus is to have them at the same time. On reflection, I'm not sure there's actually a conflict of interest with candidacy in helping to set up the pages so I'm willing to help if my help is desired. ++Lar: t/c 19:49, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

I am not convinced that new people are really needed, but generally think that it is a good idea to make that an annual event, as well as a turn of confirmation of the current stewards. Let's do that in december ! Anthere 11:41, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

OK, unless there is strong objection, and unless someone beats me to it, I will start preparing the pages (with markers on them that the elections are not underway yet) based on last years pages, for both the reconfirmations and the new elections. No changes in process, just changing dates and fresh pages. That will give time to check for errors. ++Lar: t/c 13:13, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Fresh pages aren't necessary; we just need to update the dates when they're known. —{admin} Pathoschild 15:27:04, 08 November 2007 (UTC)

I haven't actually reviewed the entire set, but ya, that's what I mean, dust off, archive what needs archiving if anything, etc. As for the dates, I propose the same exact calendar dates as last year (except, for you pedants, add a year :) ) for everything... that would be a starting point. ++Lar: t/c 18:15, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

While it could be argued that "new" people were not needed to my mind there are some current stewards who I would describe as "dormant" (politely) and I guess that alone would indicate that some fresh blood might be useful? --Herby ^{talk thyme} 13:24, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

New people is welcome, so I don't oppose election (let them do all the work so we can laze). However, I don't see a pressing need for election at this time. Requests are being handled fast enough and we don't have huge backlogs. drini ^[es:] _[commons:] 13:47, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes - I've seen in the rights log just how much you "laze" Drini:) However the last time I did needed a steward on IRC (a while back) I got no one. Equally the CU requests are frequently not speedily done (I know what disruption that can cause a small community). No "pressing need" I agree but .... --Herby ^{talk thyme} 15:21, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

I think, at the moment the stewards come through with their tasks, but if the amount of work would increase a little bit (and there were times this year with much more work), it would lead to a nice backlog. So it would just be safer/nicer/whatever to have more active people. One would have more time to do other stuff (like writing nice articles or the like or doing some other work on the "home" wiki...) if there are more people sharing the work. :o) --Thogo (talk) 18:12, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

• Is there any need for new stewards? For example, let us look... upstairs. Hillgentleman 01:25, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
  • I think so. As Herby noted, we have several dormant stewards. New people who are active and wanting to be stewards should be welcomed. --Anonymous Dissident^Talk 02:17, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

To be honest, I've been positively surprised when MaxSem made a promptly reaction for one of our needs (cross-wiki impersonation, based on sh.wikt, hr.wiki etc.). It is much different now then in 2004-2005, when mostly Angela and Anthere were giving prompt responses. While Wikipedias have their own checkusers, almost none of other projects has; and, generally, there are no needs for them. But, from time to time checkuser (and similar) actions are needed and for that reason we need prompt reaction by stewards. However, in the past year or two (with the last exception) I had to spend a lot of time to get steward help. --Millosh 09:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Steward request page organization

Based on a discussing in the #wikimedia-stewards IRC channel, I propose the following reorganization of steward request pages. This will neatly organize them under a single page (making it much easier for inexperienced users to find what they're looking for), standardize and shorten the titles (making them easy to remember), and allow for very simple scaling to meet future needs (for example, Steward requests/Usurpation will soon be created to deal with unified login merge conflicts).

User groups
Requests for permissions (RFP)	→	Steward requests/Permissions (SRP)
Requests for bot status (RFBS)	→	Steward requests/Bot status (SRB)
Other
Requests for CheckUser information (RFCU)	→	Steward requests/Checkuser (SRCU)
Requests for username changes (RFUC)	→	Steward requests/Username changes (SRUC)
Multilingual speedy deletions (MSD)	→	Steward requests/Speedy deletions (SRSD)
n/a	→	Steward requests/Usurpation (SRU)

Requests for checkuser information and username changes will thus be split from Meta requests, which are now processed by local bureaucrats and checkusers instead of stewards. (Once this is done, I'll separately propose a parallel organization under "Meta:Requests/*".) —{admin} Pathoschild 20:54:02, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I like this idea very much. The archives should be rearranged too in a similar fashion. Majorly (talk) 20:58, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Seconded. @All: Please also check SRU if something is missing or should be changed. Consider it a draft for now. --Thogo (talk) 21:09, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Eminently reasonable and sensible idea, thanks to all who sorted through this, it should help a lot. The archives may be work but rationalising them will be good. May I suggest leaving some soft redirects behind so that people who have mentioned links in talk pages and the like aren't completely at sea (I suggest soft because we presumably want to encourage new habitual names, which I think leaving real redirects would not encourage as much) ++Lar: t/c 22:10, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Comment This idea looks great to me. I say, go for it. Cary Bass ^demandez 22:21, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I have no objection, except my general bias toward not enacting a change when it provides no obvious benefit. — Dan | talk 23:18, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Standardization seems a fairly obvious benefit to me. Interfaces and data organization schemes should be predictable where possible. ++Lar: t/c 13:57, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Yeah. guillom 08:32, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

+1 —DerHexer (Talk) 09:11, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Why not? The titles should be shorter now and grouped under one base page. --FiLiP ¤ 10:17, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree with guillom, well put :) ...--Cometstyles 10:34, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes. – Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 22:25, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Ya. Daniel 23:10, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

ok, why not, --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| ∇ 23:11, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

✓--Shanel 23:13, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, M/ 13:41, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree!--Nick1915 - ^{all you want} 14:16, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

What Shanel said. Cbrown1023 talk 21:44, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Looks good to me. This will also be helpful in explaining to new metans what stewards do, when to ask them for help, &c. -- sj | help translate |+ 21:39, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Requests for stewards

Russian arb elections

Dear stewards! Please take a look at Metapub#Illegitimate_arbitrators_elections_in_Russian_Wikipedia.3F ... --Jaroslavleff 07:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Dear stewards! I want that Xosere will be removed from the sysop position at diq.wikipedia. Because of his ignorant personal views, it will be achieved no increase in this project for months. He sees himself as an individual owner of the project and prevents other people from any contribution. Although he, himself is not powerful in the Zazaish language generally. He can’t even speak its own dialect, because he is from the Central Zaza region. He destroys the project, as he contributes. My statement is absolutely true, and many others can testify it. I already started a desysop process on diq.wikipedia. Please implement whatever it is our community comes up with and help us in this matter. Thanks! --Mirzali 21:00, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Steward do not decided, try opening up a requests for comments. Cbrown1023 talk 23:34, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Boîte Utilisateur stewards

Bonjour à tous, je fais parti du projet de boîte utilisateur de la wikipédia francophone et j'ai créé récemment la boîte w:fr:Modèle:Utilisateur steward pour ceux qui ont une page personnelle sur ce wiki. Amicalement. w:fr:User:FrankyLeRoutier FrankyLeRoutier 07:44, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Import on fr:wp

As an admin on the French Wiktionary, I wanted to become an importer on the French Wikipedia for when people (usually IPs) mistakenly create Wikipedia-style articles on the Wiktionary. However The French Wikipedia doesn't seem to have any election process for this, although it does have a WP page on it!! Any idea how to get elected? Mglovesfun 19:42, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

You'd have to ask on French Wikipedia. We can give you the rights, either temporary or permanent, if you have an election on fr.wp. Using the same method as used for administrators might be a solution. Laaknor 20:25, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Desysop

I'm taking a break, so it's probably best to remove my bit in case I don't return (En:User:Deacon of Pndapetzim). Much appreciated. Deacon of Pndapetzim 21:47, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Answered on user's talk page. LeinaD (t) 22:40, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Desysop on Zazaki wikipedia

I want that Xosere will be removed from the sysop position at this project. Because of his ignorant personal views, it will be achieved no increase in this project for months. He sees himself as an individual owner of the project and prevents other people from any contribution. Among so many other of his stupid ideas he recently tries to introduce the Kurdish alphabet in Zazaki Wikipedia. See the discussion here! --Mirzali 15:05, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Our patience has gradually end up with Xosere. Please, read in detail about the matter (here, here) and you will hopefully reach a positive decision on our behalf. Best regards! --Mirzali 06:03, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Admin-Fishing

Dear Stewards,

Just to let you know, some people try to become Admin in a ... way :-(

See you :-) Fantasy 容 16:31, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

---

Forwarded message ----------

From: The WFFs <wikifreedomfighter@googlemail.com>

Date: 2009/5/11 Subject: Wikipedia e-mail To: Fantasy

Dear Fantasy,

We notice you haven't edited Wikipedia for some time. Perhaps you grew disillusioned with the project after seeing the corruption and bureaucracy at every level? If so, why not help us to help you. We are currently expanding our portfolio of administrator accounts, and as yours remains dormant perhaps you could consider donating it to us - to do so will take you only two minutes: change the password (if desired) and then reply to this email with your login details. We'll do the rest!

Thank you for your time and consideration, and naturally do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions.

Kind Regards,

The Wikipedia Freedom Fighters

-- This e-mail was sent by user "The WFFs" on the English Wikipedia to user "Fantasy". It has been automatically delivered and the Wikimedia Foundation cannot be held responsible for its contents.

---

Hello Fantasy, thanks for this, You always contact a local checkuser or a steward via [special:emailuser] and give us the IP address of this User or just forward the complete mail, I have forwarded this one now, thanks, best regards, --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| 16:43, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Do we have a good and direct abuse contact @google?

--M/ 17:05, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure why we'd need one... this isn't abuse of their services, and seems to have been handled appropriately.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 22:10, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

If you want the mail account itself suspended, it could be handy to send that and corroborating IP evidence (check the privacy policy to ensure compliance first) to Google, so they can do whatever closure/suspension/etc they want on their end. Generally, I've noticed that major search engines tend to take notes from WP people seriously enough. Kylu 12:13, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Steward reflection & activity

During this year's steward confirmations, there were a few discussions about steward activity and how to observe inactivity and encourage steady sustained contributions. We discussed making review/deflagging of inactive stewards regular and undramatic so that confirmations could focus on reliability and quality of work, as originally intended.

Mike and I came at the problem from different angles, and agreed to discuss this more over the course of the Spring. Some specific suggestions follow. -- sj | help translate |+

Discussion

from an email discussion b/t mike.lifeguard and sj

We want to define inactivity of stewards so that those who are busy or off-wiki for a while have time to get involved again; and so that there can be automatic flag removal for those with no time at all. We also want to capture all of the ways stewards help support small wikis and cross-wiki projects, many of which are not logged as steward db actions. Several stewards kept their tools [this winter] on the basis that they would become more active, or would continue to offer wisdom on stewards-l or other non-front-line venues.

Some thoughts: Launchpad helps visualize recent project activity in a useful way. I like how it defines a few different roles, and lets people gather karma through any/all of them. I even like the launchpad 'leaderboard' system that lets everyone see how they are doing and what others are up to. (who is really being active by community metrics? &c) For the inactive, guilt/reminders are useful, but should be passing --sj

We could use a reminder that there is work to do on a daily basis and to please consider setting a few user rights next week. or something equally gentle. --mike

What about something like this:

• define a crude script that checks for edits to core pages, contributions on dedicated mailing lists, bug filing w/related categories or tags (even bug comments? depends on the role for which activity is being measured), use of available tools/powers.

  nb: BryanBot has a weak version of a 'list of core pages' which has a simple editable interface for updating the list. So someone who feels their work is being undercounted can just publicly modify parts of the metrics.

  For stewards the challenge is completeness; this should list:

  1. global (un)blocks, (un)locks/hiding
  2. user rights changes (esp on yourself, which would be for oversight/checkuser on small wikis normally)
  3. mailing list posts
  4. talk page posts (could maybe count anything on steward-related pages, stewards' individual talk pages, some more general community areas)
  5. bug reports relevant to stewards

  I still like the idea of a steward-bug-watch-l mailing list. I have a number of shared Bugzilla searches. For example for CheckUser bugs, or SpamBlacklist bugs. You can (I think) see them at https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/userprefs.cgi?tab=saved-searches --mike

• the recent activity page should not focus people on their action-count but simply make it casually visible who is working on which types of tasks.

• have regular barnraisings or reminders once a <period>. [If the group of <foo> can't even define a barnraising every <period>, they are collectively being inactive in a community-building way.
  • ping everyone's talkpage and remind them to come and help out. -sj] perhaps include an additional "you have been inactive for <otherperiod> message - come help us <barnraise> this week!" for those less involved.
  • check activity stats a few weeks after a reminder/barnraising for automatic inactivity removals.

The above is not meant to be steward-specific, for easy comparison to how this is done with other activity assessments (adminship on meta, commons). For stewards, since it's already come up at the start of the year, we could have a single barnraising or reminder, start a thread on what types of metrics make sense (to shake out the lingering uncertainty about whether we're counting availability and common sense shepherding, &c), and ping all stewards on-wiki about getting involved. This might also help raise awareness about what stewards can help with [the recent renaming of Requests pages helps here also].

Under this scheme every <period> (~two weeks after a reminder) there could be automatic flag removals for those who had been inactive for a long time. Note the similarity to Commons admin review, in which simply saying "I'd like to retain my flag" counts as activity enough - we simply need to agree on what constitutes enough activity. We also have the benefit of the stewards email list to which all must be subscribed, for broadcast messages.

• Can you speak more about what Launchpad is, at least conceptually? If it's something that is a way to consolidate the kinds of activities we do and make them easier, that would be a great thing... right now there is rather a welter of pages that we need to visit to do various things, a dashboard or launchpad that maps out tasks would be really neat. Also, as a note I like the idea of semi-formalising mailing list contributions as one more metric to measure involvement. We don't want to get too focused on numbers alone but it is another metric. ++Lar: t/c 22:30, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
• I somehow fail to see that "external" software like Launchpad could be of immense help. It would just make things more complex, IMhO. Also, for what it's worth, I have 2 scripts with steward statistics: User rights changes & Stewards activity statistics. --FiliP ██ 23:00, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

What might be more useful is weekly reminders of any backlogs, if there are any. Right now, it feels like everything is handled almost immediately, which I guess makes some people look inactive because they're not on IRC to spot those things as soon as they happen. Angela 23:17, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

i strongly agree with angela here. also i watch over vandalism on smaller wikis, in which case my work doesn't always show up in the checklists above. and i'd hate to be forced into a contest for a number of log-entries really. oscar 01:11, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Also, actions on non-native wikis should be counted; it doesn't need to be even a sysop task: revert of some edit or talk with community members of small wiki xx.xx is a useful steward job. --Millosh 03:46, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Agree with Angela - I check the request pages weekly and almost all the time everything is taken care of or only requires a comment. Simply having reminders on what areas need help is enough. --Daniel Mayer (mav) 05:07, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

So what's the upshot here? :) ++Lar: t/c 23:28, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

The intent looks like a solution in search of a problem since there does not seem to be a real backlog on the Steward request pages. But I'd really like to see a centralized action backlog page that can list things Stewards can do related to SWMT actions that require sysop/steward tools (we already have the request pages here that Stewards can check). All that may be needed, is ot make tools like the delete tag check tool more prominent to Stewards and to emphasize the need (not requirement) for Stewards to help with SWMT. SWMT actions that require more-than-autoconfirmed tools most certainly should count as Steward activity during the next confirmation (rollback, delete, block, unblock, etc). A tool that can log such actions would be useful during the next confirmation. CrossActivity tool comes close, but only gives the date of last action. --Daniel Mayer (mav) 17:19, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Birdy just told me about the CrossWiki log tool, which shows all recent log activity for any user. That may be enough. --Daniel Mayer (mav) 18:48, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Appointment process

When the current process of appointment was created (having the Board appoint stewards after elections ended, not necessarily bound by the election results), the process as a whole wasn't well defined. There was disagreement about whether it would be a straight vote, what level of support was needed to appoint stewards, and how many were needed. Now the election process and schedule is more clearly defined (though it could even be a bit more reliable), and we have moved towards a simple 80% bar, so we can get by with something simpler. [having to wait for Board review of the election results has resulted in delays in years past]

On the other hand, the confirmation process is less clear cut; to speed it up this year, it was decided to have three stewards who received little or no negative feedback review the confirmation commentary and act on the results.

To cut down on delays: I propose expanding the description of the election process to include preparation and confirmation review, and to ask the same group to confirm both processes. Sj+ help translate 04:55, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Currently this page says:

Stewards are elected roughly annually by the global Wikimedia community, and appointed from the elected candidates by the Board of Trustees. The number of stewards is not limited by policies. Candidates must have a support/oppose ratio of at least 80% with at least 30 supporting users. Current stewards are confirmed during each election. Stewards are subject to the steward policies; further documentation may be found in the steward handbook.

Proposed changes

Stewards are elected roughly annually by the global Wikimedia community. Their total number is not limited. Elections are organized by existing stewards and the Volunteer Coordinator, and run for roughly three weeks. Successful candidates must have a support/oppose ratio of at least 80% more with at least 30 supporting editors.

Current stewards are also confirmed during the elections through an open call for community feedback and commentary, followed by discussion and consensus-building among the stewards. A team of stewards closes the elections and confirmation discussions. Further documentation may be found in the steward policies, election process, and handbook.

–SJ+ help translate 04:58, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Support with three corrections: (1) should be "coordinators" (plural) as experience shows that having only one coordinator is not enough; (2) Current stewards are also confirmed during the elections, through : 'also' and comma are not necessary here. Ruslik 17:44, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

Correction made. There is only one Coordinator at present. If that changes, it would be easy to change this sentence. By moving this from a Board-mandated process to a community-run process, updates to the process/language should also become easier. –SJ+ help translate 23:50, 8 March 2010 (UTC) · Updated to move the specific details to the steward elections page. –SJ+ 22:34, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

I've updated the page with the new text. –SJ+ 20:06, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Good idea :-) LeinaD (t) 22:35, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Editnotice

Due to the large ammount of requests made here concerning wikis with local bureaucrats (and thus, declined by us) I created an editnotice for SR/SUL. My english is not perfect so perhaps you may want to review the wording or add/remove further content. Best, — Dferg ☎ 18:21, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Added for SRUC too. Regards, — Dferg ☎ 21:25, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

arrange template:StewardsList in langual order

Hello, in deWP a user announced his/her suicide a few days ago. A checkuser detected the IP and notified the police.

Now there's an attempt to give quick WP-user-"adresses" in similar cases on de:WP:Verhalten im Notfall (for pendants look at the interwikis). The diffrence to enWP ist the number of checkusers: While there are 44, in deWP there're 3 and e.g. in frWP 6, in arWP 3 as well & in jaWP 7.
An important fact is the rapidity of reaction by community, (at first) no matter troll- or joke-suspicions. In projects with little number of CUs there's imho normally a lower probability of quick reaction to such cases.

The long and short of it: I want to suggest to configurate the list, so that it's easier (& faster) to find out which steward is able to understand what language. I know there's the IRC-channel, but maybe someone doesn't have got according software or the channel is emty. --Hæggis 15:15, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

The latter is not likely (in my experience there are stewards available on irc practically 24/7). The first should not be a big problem too: even without an irc client anyone can log into the stewards' channel via Freenode's Webchat. You are of course welcome to create some sort of a language matrix (perhaps with some nifty country flags), but I doubt whether that would really be useful in shortening response time. Wutsje 16:35, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Is it required to be 18 years old and have confirmed my identity to Wikimedia Founditation?--Westnest ^message 10:11, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

If you are going to be a steward, the answer is 'yes'. Ruslik 10:45, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

No, I just wondered.--Westnest ^message 14:13, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Speaking as of potential suicide threats, etc. the Foundation has created an email address to report them. It is: emergencywikimediaorg and reaches some staff members. Members of the global staff group has global CheckUser access so they can get the IP of the account (if it's a registered user). What I do not know is if they will give you the IP and therefore you must yourself inform the police or if the Foundation will inform the police themselves. I'll ask Philippe. Regards, -- Dferg ^{☎ talk} 10:52, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Correct as to the emergency@ alias and CheckUser access. We will not disclose the IP information to anyone but law enforcement, and then only in cases where there's credible threat of harm to person or property OR with a valid court order. So we wouldn't be able to release it under the circumstances you mention. Philippe (WMF) 11:02, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Arabic script in az.wikipedia

Hello. In Azerbaijan Wikipedia has a problem switching to Arabic fonts visually. (such as the Kazakh Wikipedia, they have even 3 - Latin, Arabic and Cyrillic) How do we solve this problem? More accurately as you can to help us? Sincerely, Vago 08:20, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Displaying stewards' timezone

I propose displaying stewards' time zones in the table. That information would be very useful to users who needs emergency help from stewards, such as oversighting specific revisions. There can be some difficulties in making emergency requests, especially for users who are active when most stewards sleep. And I think displaying time zone in steward elections would be better, because it can be a good reference to voters. Best regards. – Kwj2772 (msg) 09:29, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

 Support Good idea imo! Trijnstel 10:14, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I understand Kwj2772 concerns but I think not everybody would be confortable on displaying that information and therefore pseudorevealing his/her whereabouts. The #wikimedia-stewards^connect IRC channel is watched 24/7 as the stewards' OTRS queue (stewardswikimediaorg) is. I've never seen the IRC channel without any stewards there. Regards, -- Dferg ^{☎ talk} 10:21, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Why does the timezone matter in any way? Some people do late hours until 2 or 3 AM every day, some leave at 8 PM, and get up early, so what is the gain in knowing that someone is from timezone X? --თოგო ^(D) 10:24, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, that's true. Didn't think of that. Perhaps it wasn't a good idea then... :-) Trijnstel 10:28, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Instead of timezones, you could just provide a more prominent link to a webclient that logs you into the stewards irc channel. Most people who might need emergecy help will not have an IRC client handy / won't be familiar with IRC, but a webinterface would do the trick. –SJ talk | translate   17:28, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

The Freenode web client (http://webchat.freenode.net/) is quite convenient, I use it frequently from places, where other clients are not available. I don't know if it is possible to have a shortcut link that puts you into the right channel, automatically. --თოგო ^(D) 15:14, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

See w:Template:IRC, it's possible using http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=#wikimedia-stewards Cbrown1023 talk 15:38, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Clarify language

The article reads, "Successful candidates must have a support-to-oppose ratio of at least 80% more...". Does that mean anything? Is it meant to say that they must have at least 80% support, or perhaps a 4 to 1 ratio of support to oppose? Hgilbert 14:28, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

The intended meaning is ${\frac {support}{support+oppose}}\geq 0.8$, with neutrals not counted. —Pathoschild 20:52:39, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

The word "more" appears to have been an error. One could have said "at least 80%", or "80% or more". Somehow, the phrasing mostly committed to was "at least 80%", which is nicely parallel to "at least 80 supporting editors", but the word "more" got washed up there, a fragment of the alternative phrasing. It's a familiar sort of error, that happens when one changes one's mind during editing and doesn't catch quite everything that needed cleaning up. --Pi zero 12:45, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Adding mergehistory right to stewards/global sysops

Hello all, I didn't know where to place this and here seemed like the best spot, so here it goes.

A couple of days ago, I was cleaning up a copy/paste pagemove when I noticed that Wikimedia doesn't have the mergehistory right assigned to a group. After discussion with a couple of stewards who were in #wikimedia-stewards, we agreed that it might be a good thing to have.

The feature essentially allows for the easy merging of two page's histories. Special:MergeHistory has a box for the source page and a box for the destination page. Once those pages are entered in, clicking the "show merge-able edits" button shows a full list of all the edits that can be copied into the history of the destination page. From there, you can use a radio button to select which revision and up should be merged (all of them by default), and click the "merge" button. The history of the source page remains intact, but the destination page's history also contains the merged edits. This is obviously helpful for fixing copy/paste moves, and also for security while doing so. Back before revdel, admins would delete/restore a page to remove an edit from the history, and merging histories the conventional way leaves the chance that such deleted edits will be undeleted and brought back into the view-able history of the page.

I've searched for two days now, and can't find a reason for the right to not be assigned to a group by default. If it wasn't safe it wouldn't be automatically enabled in the mediawiki installation. If anyone knows a reason to not use it, please state that reason here. Beyond that, the right can be enabled via Special:GlobalGroupPermissions, so we will not require sysadmin help to enable this. Discuss away! Ajraddatz (Talk) 02:14, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

It is not enabled precisely because it duplicates history. Ruslik 07:17, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

No need for stewards and even less for global sysops who are not suposed to perform this kind of operations IMHO. -- Dferg 07:56, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

From GS; Global sysops use their tools "for the purposes of antivandalism and routine maintenance". How is fixing a copy/paste move on a wiki with no active admins outside of the GS scope? Also, I know that myself and multiple other global sysops and stewards encounter this from time to time, so I'd say that there is a need. Ajraddatz (Talk) 15:19, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

After giving it some thoughts, I think this would be better to add it to the local sysop package. -Barras 15:23, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

If so, it should be added to the local sysop package but if it duplicates histories definitelly is not a good idea. Check with devs. first why they haven't added it in first time. I find outside of routine maintenance the history merge things. Global sysops are for vandalism control, not for editorial issues and merging histories is sensitive stuff that for sure a global sysop should not be doing. At least I would not do it. --MarcoAurelio 15:28, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

According to the GS scope, routine maintenance is also within what we should be doing. Correcting a copy/paste move is not an "editorial issue", it is just the same as correcting a double redirect from a maintenance perspective, though a little bit more complicated. Ajraddatz (Talk) 16:09, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't think it's a good idea. DarkoNeko 17:24, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Insufficient Active members

Speaking almost hypothetically, what would happen in the scenario where a wiki has insufficient admins to maintain itself? The current wording "empowered to act as a member of any permissions group on any project with no active member of that permissions group" only allows for the scenario where the last admin has left. Now with small wikis that might make sense, but we have wikis so large that you could have an admin active enough to log on every couple of days for a couple of hours of blocking vandals but who doesn't also have the time to delete attack pages. What happens then? WereSpielChequers 18:37, 8 September 2011 (UTC) empowered to act as a member of any permissions group on any project with no active member of that permissions group

Generally, both stewards and global sysops would step in during a case like that and stop the vandalism - such a case actually happens reasonably often, with wikis that have a few active admins, but not enough to have full coverage 24 hours a day. Ajraddatz (Talk) 22:24, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Formulating steward elections

I stole this idea from Tanvir and have taken it out of the context he was using it so if you have a problem with the proposal please do not blame him.

I feel our election style is kind of broken. The problem is we currently make no distinction on the location the steward resides in. We should set up timezone regions to have at least two stewards available in each timezone. There is no point on having all stewards clustered in the same geographic timezone where disruption when they are sleeping would come unchecked. This hasn't been a serious problem so far but that is just our luck. The model I propose is 2+x many stewards per "region". Candidates do not have to reside in the said timezone but just need to be awake in that time period. For example someone with a more nocturnal life could work on a timezone group unrelated to where he or she happens to reside in.

Any thoughts? -- とある白い猫 ^chi? 04:49, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Not sure what is the exact idea here - is this suggesting a limitation for eligibility, or a limitation of maximum number of stewards elected 'per timezone'? --Bencmq 05:21, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Idea is to at least have 2 stewards available at specific timezone intervals. It is neither a limit on eligibility, cap on steward count or a limitation of any kind. The intention of the proposal is to have at least two stewards at each timezone interval so that a steward is available 24/7. If we end up with say 20 Stewards residing in European time zones and 0 Stewards residing in Americas time zones it would be a problem. -- とある白い猫 ^chi? 08:14, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but how do you want to enforce that? Forcing people to apply? Electing people without votes because they are in a "Zero steward" time zone? And evem mre important: How you will be sure that the stewards - after elected - will "work in their shift" even because they are still volunteers with lifes - jobs, colleges, family. Agin, how do you plan to enforce your idea? Béria Lima ^msg 18:33, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

To be honest, I don't actually understand how you get this idea from me. I am from a different timezone, but it's not the main reason that people voted for me. There are many things to consider. First of all, stewardship is a matter of quality not only eligibility. You can force, but can you guarantee we will have a qualified steward from UTC-10:00? That is not possible actually. Also, as Béria said above, they are volunteers, even I am usually awake when stewards living in Europe are in sleep, but that does not mean I will always be available that time. Quota system is evil. It actually a disgrace to merit. Sorry to say, but I personally cannot welcome this idea at all. — [ Tanvir | Talk ] 18:46, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Useless. We can't enforce this, we can't force people to be around at a certain time, I'm sometimes around early in the morning 7-8am UTC, sometimes around the day, sometimes in the night (1-2am UTC). In simple words: useless idea. Let's waste our time with something more important. -Barras 18:55, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Even in UTC-11 or UTC+12 timezones? ;p

I think the "growing up" of new stewies is proportional to the numeric consistence of a language-community, to me, no need to force in any way.

--Vituzzu 18:57, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

My proposals essence is clear. The problem I mentioned could be a real problem in the future. Evil or not a quota system is necessary. Stewards will not be expected to be available at the said time slots. Nothing about the proposal intends to force anyone to do anything.

Timezone internals could be divided into 4 with each timezone having roughly 6 hours.

• -11 to -5 (Americas, Eastern Pacific)
• -4 to -1 (Bolivia, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil Atlantic) - negligible probably adjacent timezone intervals could handle the task
• 0 to +6 (Europe, Africa, Western and Central Asia)
• +7 to +12 (Eastern Asia, Oceania, Western Pacific)

These timezone intervals aren't that difficult to "enforce". Basically what proposal suggests is that at all times there should be at least two stewards from the Americas, two stewards from Europe/Africa/Western Asia/Central Asia, and two stewards from East Asia/Ocenea. Intervals can be defined differently of course.

-- とある白い猫 ^chi? 06:46, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

But we don't want to force stewards to follow their slots. They're volunteers! How can you force a volunteer to come at certain fixed times? You're looking for problems where there aren't any. Keep also in mind that a large part of stewards tasks are not "urgent" and can easily wait a few hours after having been posted on-wiki. Savh^ñ 08:59, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

The proposal isn't asking for them to follow their time slots. The entire deal would be very informal. -- とある白い猫 ^chi? 15:52, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

We can request to state the timezone in the next round statements, as we've always done with language levels, so that voters can consider it; I don't see anything else we can do. Nemo 09:00, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Certainly this is more or less adequate. Steward list perhaps maybe needs to be classified by timezones as well as language in a sorted table. -- とある白い猫 ^chi? 15:52, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

If a steward majorly screws up...

...we have to wait until his confirmation to do anything about it, no? Purplebackpack89 22:17, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

This has never been an issue as far am I'm aware. If a steward started editing in bad faith, I don't think that bureaucracy would be an issue - the said steward would most likely have their access removed immediately after other stewards discussed it. Ajraddatz (Talk) 22:20, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

He's talking about me and the fact that I blocked him for personal attacks and general moaning on simplewiki. As such, I acted as a local admin, not a steward. Nice try PBP, but get a life dude. fr33kman 22:25, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Seems like stewards editing in bad faith is still not an issue that has been encountered ;) Ajraddatz (Talk) 22:28, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

FYI, Raddatz, his reason was "whining" Just that. "Whining". "General moaning" isn't a vaid reason either. The diff he used to justify blocking violated no policies whatsoever. He's already threatened on Meta talk page to block me here as well. Bad faith? Sure seems like it. I CAN and probably will wait until January Purplebackpack89 22:35, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

It will be in February, but if you bring over the drama from simple to meta, then you will be blocked by then. Just letting you know. -Barras 22:39, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll wait then. Consider the matter dropped if Fr33k redacts his childish block threat on my talk page that references AJona's acions more than mine Purplebackpack89 22:42, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

I redact nothing, general moaning and whining are perfectly valid reasons because they equal "general project disruption" and in addition I block you from meta as well. To quote you on simplewiki "deal with it". Ciao bella. fr33kman 22:56, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

What? Jonayo! ^{Selena 4 ever} 23:18, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

You have a question? fr33kman 23:23, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Election qualifications

I've asked a question about election qualifications over at Talk:Stewards/Elections 2012/Guidelines. Mentioning here b/c I'm not sure if anyone is watching that page. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 18:48, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

Languages

Where can one discuss the requirements for Stewards? Lots of voters have quite rightly voted neutral or against candidates who can only speak English. Maybe to avoid the same again and again at election time it would be wise for Wikimedia to finally require all Stewards to have a command of a minimum of 2 languages. All present stewards who can only speak English should have their rights removed.--Xania (talk) 20:17, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

You could start a Requests for comment on the issue, but quite frankly, as somebody who has successfully stood for the steward election with 90%+ support (and I only speak one language), the issue isn't quite as widespread as you think. PeterSymonds (talk) 20:21, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

It's nice for stewards to be able to understand/speak more than one language, but most (well, actually all) of our intern as well as any other conversation is in English. It'd rather see that every candidate is able to speak English. -Barras talk 20:28, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Stewards' job is not really translating, but cross-wiki tasks - that could be on both simplewiki and enwiki, and maybe encommons, for instance.Jasper Deng (talk) 00:04, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

That's not really a good example - stewards generally stay away from those wikis since they have active admins. The reality here which some people don't understand is that 95% of Wikimedians (in my experience) speak passable English. Having stewards that can speak more than one out of hundreds of languages really doesn't help - they will still use English 95% of the time, and for the other 5% there is only a small chance that their spoken language will be the one needed. The issue here is misunderstanding by voters and not monolingual stewards.

I am not saying that all conversations should happen in English, but in the current reality most do. Ajraddatz (Talk) 00:21, 27 February 2012 (UTC)