- Frequently Asked Questions (or ones I expect to be frequently asked)
- Why are you doing this?
Several reasons:
- RfA has become too restrictive; we're not passing enough people to keep up with the rate we're losing administrators, and we're scaring off good candidates. By instituting an accessible means to remove administrators at the wish of the community, it is the hope those standards should lessen some so we can get back to adminship being "no big deal"
- As I mentioned, we're losing admins rapidly. The stats I give in the lead section of the proposal help illustrate this,and we've lost around 16 admins in the past month alone.
- ArbCom really is only suitable for really really really bad cases of admin abuse. That's how they were set up, and that's how they function. That's not likely to change for a while. We need an intermediate step that can hold admins accountable the way the community seems to want, but that doesn't terrorize admins into becoming afraid of the very buttons they're asked to use.
- You do know we've been through this before, right?
- Oh yeah. A list, in case you didn't actually know, is here: Wikipedia:Requests for de-adminship#Proposed_processes. (*waits for the "GAHH!! That's a huge list, are you NUTS!?!" reaction*) No, I'm not crazy, and in fact we're trying to work on some of the failings of past proposals. I'm not saying it's perfect, but we're hoping this is an improvement.
- Why admin-only voting? OR Why can't new users comment?
- That is intended as a precaution against mob-rule type discussions. While the community may not be happy with Abusive Admin X, he has rights too, among them a fair chance to defend himself. These restrictions have been placed to ensure that things don't get totally out of control, and that those participating do have some understanding of policy. When tempers run high, people tend to bite more often, and we don't want a newbie's head to get caught between someone's jaws.