Wikimedia Meta-Wiki

Talk:Stewards/Confirm/2020

< Talk:Stewards
Latest comment: 4 years ago by Stryn in topic Final decisions (by stewards)
Learn more about this page
This page allows for general discussion and questions regarding the 2020 steward confirmations.

Final decisions (by stewards)

Latest comment: 4 years ago753 comments27 people in discussion

Confirmation discussions will remain open from 29 February 2020, 00:00 (UTC) till 7 March 2020, 23:59 (UTC). This may be extended to two weeks for one or more confirmations at the discretion of the Election Committee if the committee believes further input is required before concluding. The Election Committee will close these discussions and implement the outcome (which also means making a decision in non-obvious cases).

This page is for steward discussion only. Please do not comment in this box unless you are a steward.

The summaries below provide a very strict overview of the most relevant confirmation comments.

Stewards: Please leave your comments right below the boxes after reviewing the actual confirmation comments and your understanding of relevant policies. You may summarize the confirmation discussions in individual comments, but no overall summary is given.

Status Candidate Notes
   Confirmed
 -revi clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Base clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Bsadowski1 clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Defender clear consensus
   Confirmed
 DerHexer clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Einsbor clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Green Giant clear consensus
   Confirmed
 HakanIST clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Hoo man clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Jon Kolbert clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Jyothis clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Linedwell clear consensus
   Confirmed
 MarcoAurelio clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Mardetanha confirmed
   Confirmed
 Masti clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Matanya clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Matiia clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Melos clear consensus
   Confirmed
 NahidSultan clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Pmlineditor clear consensus
   Confirmed
 QuiteUnusual clear consensus
   Confirmed
 RadiX clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Ruslik0 clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Rxy clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Schniggendiller clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Shanmugamp7 clear consensus
   Removed
 Sjoerddebruin consensus to remove
   Confirmed
 Stryn clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Tegel clear consensus
   Resigned
 Teles did not run for confirmation
   Removed
 There'sNoTime consensus to remove
   Confirmed
 Trijnstel clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Vituzzu clear consensus
   Confirmed
 Wim b clear consensus
   Confirmed
 علاء clear consensus
Results

The confirmation discussions are now closed. Please check the results right above.

Note
The discussion about Mardetanha was extended to two weeks (until 14 March 2020, 23:59).

For the Election Committee, RadiX∞ 23:43, 8 March 2020 (UTC)Reply

After an extension of the discussion the Election Committee

-revi

  Keep: 106 (active / very active / trusted / helpful / friendly / helps in various areas / strong judgement / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 2

Base

  Keep: 50 (active / very active / trusted / helpful / always ready to help / hopes activity increase - user become more active / lower activity in one year is not a problem / deserves another chance / no reason given)
  Remove: 7 (no statement / tools have't been used in so long / no reason given)
  Neutral: 1

Bsadowski1

  Keep: 68 (active / very active / LTA - spambot hunter / helpful / responsive / very accessible / helpful / always on IRC)
  Remove: 2 (no 'language entry' / no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Defender

  Keep: 64 (active / very active / helpful / good efforts / active at counter-vandalism tasks / helpful / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

DerHexer

  Keep: 87 (fairly active / technical skills / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Einsbor

  Keep: 67 (active in SRP and AAR related tasks / scrutineer for ArbCom elections / good work / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 0
  Neutral: 1 (no reason given)

Green Giant

  Keep: 56 (active in replying OTRS tickets / active in fighting spambots / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no 'language entry')
  Neutral: 0

HakanIST

  Keep: 65 (active enough / no issues / trusted steward / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Hoo man

  Keep: 59 (technical skills and expertise / active enough / no issues / 'maintainer of CentralAuth' / trusted steward / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 2 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 3 (activity level / no reason given)

Jon Kolbert

  Keep: 60 (good activity / good and abundant work / a lot of good work / good steward / very active / friendly / trusted / active in IRC/SRG and elsewhere / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (blank statement at the beginning of the confirmations)
  Neutral: 0

Jyothis

  Keep: 40 (no issues / polite and positive approach / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Linedwell

  Keep: 68 (active in SRCU and SRG pages and so on / trusted user / trusted steward / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 0
  Neutral: 0

MarcoAurelio

  Keep: 96 (active in almost every task / one of the most helpful stewards / very active / always helpful / incredibly helpful / reasonably active / active / very active / great work / good technical skills / no reason given)
  Remove: 0
  Neutral: 0

Mardetanha

  Keep: 91 (trusted user / experienced user / good communication skills / neutral person / there is no evidence for government interference throughout Mardetanha's past-current terms / controversies are based on speculation / there is no wrongdoing / user has never abused his rights / multilingual / user always follows Wikimedia policies / user has not violated any of the community guidelines / cases where state authorities exert pressure on Wikipedia volunteers are quickly noticeable / Mardetanha has assured his account is being operated in a safe environment / there is no connection between Persian Wikipedia and the Iranian government / no reason given)
  Remove: 35 (several concerns regarding Mardetanha's involvement with Iranian government and his account security - a session with the ministry of culture, some interviews on behalf of Wikipedia and Wikimedia in the state TV etc / Iranian government's effort to ab[use] Wikipedia[ns] / Iranian authorities could force him to disclose private information / no one living inside Iran is immune to the sting of local government / it's about not trusting Iranian government / not comfortable with someone having this access level in Iran / there is evidence that the Iranian governemnt knows Mardetanha's identity / Mardetanha's personal information is known publicly / government is interested in manipulating Wikipedia)
  Neutral: 8 (same as above / closure of Requests for comment/Do something about azwiki)

  • I'm going to say confirm. I understand some user's concerns, but I think community still trust Mardetanha to be a steward and they think that he can handle it, as he has been doing it for some years. While concerns are valid, if some action should be taken against Mardetanha due to users' security, I think this is something to be handled by WMF, not us. Matiia (talk) 04:22, 29 February 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Weak confirm Definitely not a clear outcome and I tend to agree with Matiia. This should be handled by the WMF. Trijnsteltalk 12:45, 29 February 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep I totally understand the concerns of my fellow Wikimedians from the region. I also know the lengths Mard goes to protect his access to the system. Having served together this long - yep, it has been a while :) - and met him in real life during Wikimania, I have no reason to doubt his commitment and his passion to the mission. I am going to stand with the values he bring to the table and the efforts he takes to advance the project in the region where free knowledge is a premium. Thank you for the continued support and please keep pushing further. -Jyothis (talk) 13:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Weak confirm, for reasons already given above. Linedwell [talk] 14:53, 29 February 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • I don't know, I really don't know. I have been thinking about this (spontaneously, though) during Feb. I still don't know what is best for him - he's competent, he knows what they are doing and he has been fine for almost a decade. However contacting those voted to remove them privately to rescind their vote is something that shouldn't have been done, and I also get the point that you should not work with dictators - those who ignores basic human rights. I'm not sure about the result - but I think I should say what my conscience tell me to say, with regret: it might be best for him if he continues contributing without stewards hat. I don't mean it to say Mardetanha's performance as a Stewards was poor or I have grudge on him or something like that - I trust him and worked with him for few years, but I just think given the circumstances (Government knows who he is, which already have a history of doing shits, and that sort of circumstances) it might not be a good idea to continue with the hat which allows lot of PII without being detected. — regards, Revi 15:17, 29 February 2020 (UTC)Reply
  • I do trust you, I know you and know what you have done for Wikimedia. But I do not trust your government. I know you have a safe and secure password, but I also know that if they want to compromise your access, they will find a way. And it won't be visible in logs. To sum up, I think there are two solutions: first, WMF should decide if they are OK with a steward that is known to Iranian government, second, it is up to you. To be honest, you could do a lot to Wikimedia as a global sysop, without access to sensitive data. What is better? Not my decision, but in my opinion there are serious voices to remove. --einsbor talk 19:47, 29 February 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Weak remove per einsbor - raised concerns are too important for me to vote to keep. I'll be happy to support you as a GS through. --Martin Urbanec (talk) 18:58, 1 March 2020 (UTC) I'm not, however, in a set-to-stone position - and my opinion is probably similar to those who say "Weak keep" here. --Martin Urbanec (talk) 19:28, 1 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep. I prefer to trust Mard and, if evidence is presented of government interference, ask the WMF to intervene. Same for any of us - all governments may interfere even so called democracies QuiteUnusual (talk) 09:34, 2 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep – Per QuiteUnusual. We are being really naive if we think other governments would never engage in subversive actions. Mardetanha is at no more risk from the Iranian govt than I am from my govt. In all my years of wiki-editing, I have strived to keep my identity as secret as possible, with my real name only being revealed by email to one other Wikimedian (who may or may not be deceased). Despite this, I do not doubt that if the police or intelligence agencies of my country wanted to hack my account or find out my password(s) they could do so quite easily, even if we have strong laws to protect rights. Do you really think they would struggle to find my IP, track my address and turn up at my door? In fact I can almost guarantee that my govt has a secret file about me and how much or how little danger I pose. If we are going to single out Mardetanha, then let’s remove every steward, CU, OS, bureaucrat, and sysop because I do not believe anyone is safe from any government. If there is an issue, it can be dealt with by other stewards and where necessary by WMF Staff. –Green Giant (talk) 22:17, 2 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep. As previously stated, government interference is possible elsewhere. I believe this is a matter of trust and I've full trust in Mardetanha's capability of integrity and discretion regarding advanced rights.--HakanIST (talk) 11:23, 4 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep per QuiteUnusual --Alaa :)..! 12:18, 4 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep. Mostly per above. All of us can be tracked down. We are citizens of our contries, we have contracts with our ISPs, we use mobile carriers, many of us engage in international travel to attend Wikimania and other conferences and so forth. We should not underestimate governments and we should not build illusions that our own governments are nicer. Yes, some would resolve to atrocious acts and some wouldn't, or would not as often, but all of them could potentially find the information we have access to useful. We take the risk and evaluate our own circumstances. WMF indeed might at one point decide that for example stewards from Holy See are to be no more and that would be it, but I do not want the community to set up discriminatory rules ahead of it. That being said, I did not like some thing mentioned, especially the mention of Mardetanha emailing voters, this is a fault IMO, but a minor one for now. --Base (talk) 10:21, 5 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep per QuiteUnusual --Melos (talk) 21:27, 6 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep per QuiteUnusual. -- Tegel (Talk) 19:15, 7 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Neutral, per -revi and QuiteUnusual. There are some valid concerns for the removal, which shouldn't be discussed publicly, but Mardetanha has been doing an awesome job and is a great help. —Thanks for the fish! talk•contribs 23:14, 7 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep per QuiteUnusual Jon Kolbert (talk) 23:19, 7 March 2020 (UTC)Reply
  •   Keep per QuiteUnusual. Ruslik (talk) 16:04, 8 March 2020 (UTC)Reply

Confirmed

Most of the stewards who shared their opinion said that they still trust Mardetanha, although some criticized that he contacted afterwards the users not in favor of him. Many stewards shared the view that if it's not safe for him to hold the stewards flag it should be stated by the Wikimedia Foundation.

- For the Election Committee, Stryn (talk) 08:24, 16 March 2020 (UTC)Reply

Masti

  Keep: 67 (no issues / very active / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 2 (users' opinion on large IP-rangeblocks / no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Matanya

  Keep: 47 (no issues / technical skills / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 1 (no visible contribution)

Matiia

  Keep: 47 (helpful / helpful in all areas / reasonably active / competent / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 3 (meta-only user profile / only dedicated to countervandalism work / biased against large wikis / activity on the lower side / no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Melos

  Keep: 52 (technical skills / 'maintainer of SULWatcher and StewardBot' / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 1 (not very active)

NahidSultan

  Keep: 57 (good activity / friendly / professional / very helpful / no issues / trusted / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 0

Pmlineditor

  Keep: 41 (no issues / reasonably active / no issues / no reason given)
  Remove: 1 (no reason given)
  Neutral: 1 (not very active)