User:Monsieur Crow/What Makes An Admin

This is an essay, a page containing the advice or opinions of one or more SmashWiki contributors. You may heed it or not, at your discretion.

So, you think you got what it takes to go for the promised land and become an administrator? Before you start running into the fray, try reading this essay, and see if you actually have the skillset before you end up wasting everyone's time. As someone who has seen possibly hundreds of adminship events since 2008, these are some trends that make good admins and bad admins, both from looking at failed RfAs and admins that were, or are, badly over-matched for their job.

The Golden Rules of Adminship

With very few exceptions, all editors on SmashWiki would be more effective and capable editors with administrator tools. As a result, candidates for adminship should not strictly attempt to justify why they deserve administrator tools. The reason we have the entire RfA system is that the tools of the administrator are extremely powerful. Blocking and locking can completely stop actions on SmashWiki, as to allow for a period of time where users can have their say, or to stop abuses of the system; however, misuse of either of these tools can create a negative atmosphere, whether for users questioning whether the admin is entirely right in the head, or even causing users to quit out of disgust, potentially leading to negative word-of-mouth surrounding SmashWiki. Owing to this, candidates for adminship should justify why they can be trusted with administrator tools.

What makes a good admin

Ability to enforce guidelines

What separates an admin from a regular user? Blocking and locking. When it comes to adminship, this is the million dollar question: "Can X candidate be trusted with blocking and locking tools?" Has the user made an attempt to talk to users, and more importantly, have they done so in a way that doesn't smack of sabre rattling or snootiness? Enforcing policy is one thing; enforcing policy with tact is another. Remember: Outside of administrating the Wiki, administrators should see themselves as representatives of a Wiki, able to promote a good, healthy image of SmashWiki on and off its servers.

People skills

SmashWiki fosters itself on being a collaborative environment. Everyone is expected to work together, within reason, to help make SmashWiki one of the best possible guides it can be.

Ultimately, administrators should show a willingness to speak out on issues without the input of others. Whether it's a user dispute, disagreement over an article, proposed policy, or similar dispute, administrator candidates should be able to demonstrate that they can take charge in such a way that promotes growth.

Furthermore, in the event that the candidate ends up disagreeing with others, there exists the question of how well they respond to it. Do they start claiming they're more mature and walk away? Do they try to collaborate with the others? Do they stick their heads in the sand and refuse to talk? Do they admit that they are wrong? Do they start damning with faint praise? Do they make you faint with their damn praise? Handling oneself in a debate, no matter how big or small, is important to how users should view adminship candidates. Do you go for a loose cannon that can't take an iota of criticism, or do you go for an admin that's willing to consider the opposing viewpoint in order to get the job done?

As a final note, while it is not necessary for a successful RfA, candidates should demonstrate an ability to effectively communicate off the Wiki. Once again, administrators should see themselves as representatives of SmashWiki, able to promote a good image off the Wiki. A loose cannon is not acceptable, and neither is an immature brat.

Decision-making

Blocking and locking are both serious actions and require admins to know whether or not a dispute or problem requires use of either tool. One wrong move can create a negative environment, especially if it appears a conflict of interest caused such a decision. Some decisions are simple, such as blocking a vandal. But decisions where there may not be a clear-cut "wrong" party become less obvious to solve.

More importantly, however, is that admins need to be able to quickly, but decisively, decide when to use such tools. An impulsive admin is no better than a vandal and will have to waste time trying to justify their poor decision-making, as well as clean up their mess; an indecisive admin, however, is essentially just wasting his or her tools.

A willingness to learn

Admins are people, and people will make mistakes. It happens to the best of us, and no admin has ever been perfect. However, the mistakes of an admin will come under much greater scrutiny than those from regular users. Like any other user, however, admins must demonstrate a willingness to learn from their errors, whether by directly addressing it, or indirectly changing their behaviour in response. Furthermore, such a change must be obvious to an outside observer; anyone can say "I'll work on it," but only some will truly work on it. And remember: If you have to constantly claim you've changed your behaviour, you probably haven't.

For this reason, I am actually more likely to support a candidate who has made his or her fair share of mistakes and demonstrated an ability to learn from them; it demonstrates an appropriately level head, and that they only have the potential to get better as they work more and more on SmashWiki. A candidate who has never made a mistake is a wild card, and if they suddenly find themselves under the microscope after making a mistake, there's no telling what sort of reaction we'll get. And of course, the candidate who gets pissy in response to criticism is one we should never accept in the first place.

What doesn't make a good admin

"Why not?"

This is, unquestionably, the worst possible reason to make anyone an admin. It implies that you're not actually sure of how the user would act as admin. Users should not gamble on an admin being good; a candidate should demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are competent to be admin. If you ever have to ask "Why not?" for an admin candidate, it's time to oppose them.

"We need more admins"

Another terrible reason. Editors should neither raise nor lower their expectations of administrator candidates just because there's more or less of them that are active. If the perfect candidate entered the room with 8 active administrators, would you say no? Of course not. And if there were no active admins, would you allow an inherently flawed candidate to become admin? Again, of course not.

"I'm tough on vandals"

With the rollbacker group already becoming saturated as-is, vandalism is less of an issue than ever before. After all, constantly rollbacking a vandal is quite similar to a block. Sure, blocking is a useful tool, but knowing how and when to block is far more important than actually blocking. Which requires our candidate to be knowledgeable about what it takes to be an admin: blocking a vandal, or blocking a potentially misguided user?

Also, let's be honest, the only people that won't claim to be tough on vandals will be vandals themselves. And if it's a selling point for everyone, then it's not a selling point.

"I'm very active"

So you log into SmashWiki everyday. Nice work. However, in doing so, what have you proven? Probably nothing. Being active does not automatically make a good admin. Toomai (talk•contribs•logs) doesn't log in every single day, and he's a fine admin. Conversely, Shaun's Wiji Dodo (talk•contribs•logs) was active almost every day at one point, and he was never viewed as a serious admin candidate due to his immature conduct.

"I live outside of the United States"

Most of SmashWiki and its editors are based in America, and having admins active outside of our hours may seem pretty useful. But to make it a strong selling point is weak. Essentially, the only worthwhile argument for living outside of the United States is that it lets you combat vandalism while the rest of the Wiki is sleeping; this more or less overlaps with "I'm tough on vandals", in that SmashWiki already has an abundance of rollbackers, and again, being tough on vandalism is no longer a selling point of adminship.

Solar Dragon (talk•contribs•logs) lived in the United Kingdom, was active every day at one point, and had administrator experience. However, he was never considered a serious candidate for adminship on SmashWiki, owing to his self-admitted immature conduct and a number of other problems involving him and some other users, including one of our administrators.

"I'm a nice guy"

Adminship is ensuring that the future of SmashWiki is safe given any and all adversity. Being a nice guy who gets run over by other users isn't useful for an admin. Granted, an admin shouldn't be outright insulting other users, but they should know when to put his or her foot down.

You know who's a nice guy? Anther. But he's also never edited SmashWiki, and I wouldn't want him to be an admin as a result. Conversely, our old friend Semicolon (talk•contribs•logs) didn't exactly have a million dollar personality when it came to people who really didn't get SmashWiki and its policies. Regardless, he was a still fine admin, owing to the points atop the page; he knew how to handle user disputes, and how to best use his admin skills.

"I'm active on IRC / Discord"

IRC and Discord have always been considered separate entities from SmashWiki; there's a reason that bans on the former two aren't reflected on SmashWiki and vice versa. Could adminship of such a channel be a useful tool for an RfA? Probably. But simply sitting on an IRC server won't make your case stronger. By design, IRC and Discord are very lax in their policing, and are much more informal in tone; I know I said people skills are important, but SmashWiki and its professional tone trumps IRC / Discord and their informal tones. How would you feel if you ran a prestigious law firm, and a job candidate said he had great people skills from holding house parties with tons of beer lying around?

Mousehunter321 (talk•contribs•logs) was a part of the Core Four of 2012 (alongside myself, HavocReaper48, and Megatron1), and was considered an extremely strong candidate for adminship, possibly the most out of the four of us. Despite this, he almost never used IRC, and communicated almost entirely through talk pages. Conversely, Brian was infamous for his flamebaiting, trollbaiting, and frequent violations of policies, including NPA and 1RV, and he was also extremely active on IRC. 'Nuff said.

"I've been around for a while"

Simply being active on the Wiki for a long period of time doesn't automatically make a case for adminship stronger. If someone spent 5 years on the Wiki, but continued acting like a blockhead just like the day they joined, would you accept their RfA? Of course not. Does activity have a role in adminship? Yes. But using by itself is useless.

Air Conditioner (talk•contribs•logs) had three years of experience before she became inactive, and she had even been viewed as a potentially fringey candidate a bit before she left. She knew her limits, however, and refused to ever run for adminship, aware that her temper could cloud her judgement and prevent her from effectively and safely using the administrator's toolset. Conversely, Omega Tyrant (talk•contribs•logs) was only active for a few months before getting adminship, owing to his ability to enforce policy, get involved with user disputes, and his need to delete pages.

"I'm a good editor"

This one, I feel, is one that is heavily misused. Candidates keep trying to use their huge xyz project as the reason they deserve adminship, or how xyz shows they can handle adminship. But while being a good editor is always welcome, the skillsets of being a good editor and being a good admin are different.

If someone made 100 articles, but never spoke to anyone and never bothered to enforce policy, would you give them adminship? Of course not. Adminship is built on how well you can collaborate with others and how well you can police the userbase. Will all your fancy projects demonstrate that? Probably not, unless they're huge collaborations with a number of other users... and if everyone just did their work without a single argument, it doesn't demonstrate that you need the admin skillset. It just shows you can delegate.

Emmett (talk•contribs•logs) was never huge on mainspace edits. I don't think he ever had a huge project, and most of his edits were rather minor. How did he become a bureaucrat? He was excellent at handling user disputes of all sorts. Didn't hurt that he wrote tonnes of policies that are still being used to this day, including mainstays such as NPA, TALK, and SIGN.

Also, we already have two janitor admins who sit back and barely take part in the user side of matters. We don't need another.

"I'm good with rollback"

This is like saying that if you know how to load a Super Soaker, you can operate a sub-machine gun with no issues. Rollback is almost solely designed for combatting vandalism; any user, however, can combat vandalism, and simply using rollback as an attempt to pad your résumé just smacks of desperation. The actual process to get Rollback is also no longer as nearly complicated as it once was, and at this point, getting rollback just means you've been in the right place at the right time, something we shouldn't reward with automatic adminship.

"X user supports me"

This is an argument that can go either way, but ultimately, it should not be considered a serious factor. The first thing to remember is that having a large number of people support you means nothing; RfAs have not, do not, and will not run on vote count, and sucking up to a lot of people to get them on your side only shows you can suck up to a lot of people, not be an effective admin. Endorsements from an admin, or any particularly well-established user, may carry more weight, but remember, admins are not kings, and they shouldn't be fighting your battles; if the tide turns against you, you can't hope for an admin to fish you out of your mess. Furthermore, strictly relying on an administrator in hopes of getting through will only make you seem weak and unable to form your own decisions, characteristics unbecoming of an administrator.

Also, if you have several well-established users and admins already telling you to make an RfA, why on earth are you reading this page? You should probably already know what a good RfA requires.

What doesn't make a good oppose reason

"X user is not active on Discord"

Read above on why IRC / Discord is unimportant to judging a candidate's credentials. To repeat: SmashWiki's Discord server and SmashWiki itself are two separate entities, and experience in one should not strictly reflect experience on the other.

Plus, some of us just don't like Discord.

"X user is mean"

"Mean" is a very subjective term. On one hand, we shouldn't accept a candidate who has a history of calling people "fucking retards". On the other hand, there exists the question of what "mean" means. OT is somewhat infamous for his sometimes biting criticism of users who never attempt to learn from their mistakes; to what extent, however, is this considered mean? Most users will get aggravated at a user who never learns, and ultimately, more and more forceful language may be required to finally drill the point in.

Also, swearing isn't automatically "mean" behaviour. Get over it.

"We have too many admins"

This overlaps with the "We need more admins" reasoning above. A qualified candidate is a qualified candidate is a qualified candidate; the number of active administrators has no effect on whether they would be competent with admin tools or not, and again, editors should not allow their expectations of administrators be raised or lowered in response to changes in activity.

Let's say that we reject an ideal admin candidate just because we have "too many admins". What happens if one of those admins has to go on extended leave two hours after the RfA is rejected? Saying "Whoops, sorry pal, didn't see that one coming, be sure to apply again!" is unacceptable; he or she should have been accepted in the first place.

PenguinofDeath (talk•contribs•logs) is still one of the finest admins SmashWiki has ever had, and to this day, I have tried to model my own SmashWiki career after his. When his RfA was accepted, there were seven active admins and two semi-active ones.

"X user would be better as admin"

Excluding someone from adminship simply because there is a better candidate is unacceptable. The goal of an RfA is to determine if the candidate is competent to be admin, not to play the comparison game. If you want X user to become an admin so badly, convince them to run; don't denigrate someone for not being your preferred candidate. If I could, I'd vote for HavocReaper48 (talk•contribs•logs) to be admin. But he's inactive and I don't foresee him coming back any time soon. Regardless, I'm not going to oppose someone for simply not being Havoc.

For similar reasons, in the event two or more RfAs are going on, do not attempt to compare candidates, and do not think that only one candidate should "win". Adminship is not a contest, and all admins should be judged strictly by their own qualifications and credentials.