Battlestar Wiki:Requests for adminship/The Merovingian (3)

The Merovingian

Vote here (6/0/1) ending 05:36 {{{Ending}}} (UTC)

The Merovingian (talk • contribs) – The Merovingian's history with us has not been entirely smooth. During his first months with us, his unmatched energy and enthusiasm for the project were sadly tempered with an impatience and quickness to anger which did not recommend him for adminship.

In the last few months, his demeanor has improved drastically, and he has acquired a remarkable maturity and level-headedness. This track record was unfortunately marred by an incident three months ago, involving a series of attacks against fan reporter Jim Iaccino, a.k.a. "KoenigRules". The results of this were such that I was forced to oppose his last nomination for adminship - despite his recently improved behavior, I felt he needed to demonstrate that he was capable of adhering to higher standards on a permanent basis.

It is my opinion that Merv has done so. He now makes persuasive arguments in rational tones, he appeals and defers to group consensus when appropriate, and he has been helpful and patient with new users.

Merv has always been a contributor of the highest order. As one of the most serious and vocal opponents of his adminship in the past, it is my pleasure to state my belief that Merv has demonstrated the maturity and patience to wield admin privileges responsibly and effectively. I would be honored to work alongside him as an administrator. --Peter Farago 00:37, 28 July 2006 (CDT)

Candidate, please indicate acceptance of the nomination here:--I am The Merovingian, and I accept this nomination. --The Merovingian ^{(C - E)} 17:51, 30 July 2006 (CDT)

Support

Support as nominator. --Peter Farago 00:37, 28 July 2006 (CDT)
Support I am delighted to support, based both on absolutely superb contributions and behavior that has steadily improved to its currently decorous state. --CalculatinAvatar^(C-T) 04:18, 28 July 2006 (CDT)
Support Has made excellent contributions in the last few weeks. --FrankieG 06:40, 28 July 2006 (CDT)
Support. I feel gaining Peter's support after all this time is no mean feat. You've earned mine as well for the same criteria. With great power comes...well, you know the rest. Get your mop and bucket. --Spencerian 07:10, 28 July 2006 (CDT)
Support I've been highly impressed with his contributions and such here recently. --Talos 13:05, 29 July 2006 (CDT)
Support Merv was the second user to greet me when I came here. I was overzealous when I first arrived, but he helped me to temper myself through helpful suggestions that were not rude or even bossy. He's an excellent editor here and I couldn't think of a better choice for admin. --Homeworld616 01:33, 30 July 2006 (CDT)

Oppose

Oppose With all due respect, the arguement that a couple of months of improved behavior is equivalent to "adhering to higher standards on a permanent basis" is unpersuasive. KR was not the subject of a mere prank or fan infighting, but suffered an intrusion in his professional life that can not be overlooked for a nice e-mail and the submission of some articles, no matter how well done. Those of us who work in professional environments know that administrative and organizational memory for this kind of thing is not wiped clean even when it falls below the threshold for disciplinary action. Some errors in judgement are simply incompatable with being trusted with positions of authority, and I believe this is the case here, whatever his contributions. Mero may be a talented contributor and editor, but he should remain so. --~~Cranky1c 12:08, 16 March 2006 (EST)~~

Member since 31 July 2006. Vote will not be counted.---->As a countermeasure against voter fraud, you have to be a member of BattlestarWiki for at least 3 weeks before you're allowed to vote (and even then, your vote might be cast in a bad light if you only occassionally contribute). This person joined less than 6 hours ago. Yikes. --The Merovingian ^{(C - E)} 23:32, 30 July 2006 (CDT)

Neutral

Neutral Ok this was a tough decision and most certainly isnt mean as an attack as an oppose. I definitly think you are over a lot of the bad stuff that happened in the past but there are still times when arguments get a little out of hand and when you make changes before concensus is made. I also think the whole Koenigrules issue was a pretty big thing and its hard to forget that. Apologies are fair enough but you need to think a little more about how your actions can affect other people. I think this needs to be made completely clear too. And if you does make admin I most definitly dont want to see posts on Skiffy and other forums of you "speaking on behalf" of the Wiki as has done in the past. I'm still skeptical about if another bad situation is going to arise in the future, and if so then it may bring the whole of the Wiki into disrepute as you would be an admin. So just be very very careful about what you say/do outside of the wiki. Good luck Merv, but im staying neutral on this one. --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 10:54, 30 July 2006 (CDT)
Neutral I'm going to have to weigh in a neutral vote. I'm actually leaning NO, but sitting on Neutral becase Peter thinks he's ready now and I want to respect his assessment. I'm utterly baffled that this process has gone on for nearly a year and three previous failed admin votes, in which at least one of them Merv nominated himself, and in the other two he accepted. I guess the one question I have is "why does this position matter" so much? He didn't even refuse the nomination after the KR incident, which would have been the honorable thing to do. In previous RFA's, he's bragged that he had a Plan R ready (recruitment) to essentially troll for votes at other forums. (Mercifully, this was not employed during the last RFA). Still, the question begs to be answered: Why does this position matter so much? Why is being a contributor not good enough?--Larocque6689 21:46, 30 July 2006 (CDT)

Comments

It's only been a month since the last RFA. Why are we going through this again so soon? Edit: Please ignore the last question. I just noticed it was Peter who made the nomination. --Larocque6689 19:06, 30 July 2006 (CDT)

Questions for the candidate
A few generic questions to provide guidance for voters:

1. What duties, if any, would you anticipate helping with? Please check out Battlestar Wiki:Project List's for a list of projects.

A. Episode Summaries, episode analysis, episode questions, episode notes. Character bios. Cylon series. Spearheading the Writer/Director category project. Furthing the Timeline project (and fighting the grave threat posed by the Season two timeline discontinuity). The Battles series (which I created). Going through every source of information available, be it GalacticaStation, GateWorld, NowPlayingMagazine, Lucy Lawless fansites, Ron Moore's blog, the official messageboards, and post as much information as possible on this Wiki, and turn it into a truly reliable "go-to" site for up to the minute BSG information, **making sure that all of the information we post is properly sourced.

B. Expanding our Cast and Crew articles, which so far are kind of sparse. This is major ongoing project.

2. Of your articles or contributions here, are there any about which you are particularly pleased, and why?

A. The battles pages, all of which were of my own design (I made the battleboxes for Lord of the Rings battles on standard wikipedia, and when these were done, I wanted to keep doing something like that so I created the battles series here)

B. Due to my vast knowledge of BSG trivial facts and analysis, I have made great contributions to the episode guides, and as it's not like I have a life outside of this :) I'm usually the first to post notes for an episode up after it airs (though this is not a rule), and I'm really happy with the episode guide stuff I've done (check the history tabs, etc). I guess a random sampling of some of my better works would be Downloaded, Cally, Uniform, Fall of the Twelve Colonies etc., my great contributions to Life Forms of the Twelve Colonies (ever vigilant),...and pretty much the entire episode guide. I spearheaded the movement (after debate for months) to give Cylon copies who have become individuals their own character pages, and to consider them separate characters.

C. Created and implemented the Episode Standardization project, in which I removed the "mini-reviews" from our Season 1 episode guide and replaced them with (I hope) impartial Analysis.

D. Helping out on the Welcoming Committee.

E. I tried to work things out with Koenigrules after what happened the other month; last RFA I was shocked that KR thought I hadn't appologized for what happened (I did, completely, I just made a big mistake which I retract); however rather than draggint things out in the open I tried to work things out through Private Messages on the bboards since my last RFA, which I felt was the more mature thing to do.

F. Since my initial time at BattlestarWiki, as Peter mentioned above, I've gone from "biting the noobs" to gently trying to help along new users. See this page for one example. Also, as Homeworld616 said above, he was a new user and rather than becoming impatient that he was unfamiliar with things here (as I might have a year ago) I helped him along with constructive imput.

G. Updating the Portals Project pages, and my extensive contributions and revisions/restucturing of the Cylon agent speculationpage (Jammer = Cylon), as well as Science in the Re-imagined Series

H. Asking a large portion of questions on Battlestar Wiki:Official Communiques; I hate it when other websites get to talk to someone like, Katee Sackhoff, and half the questions are "wow, why are u so hot?" "Wow, is it fun to work on the show?" etc. I'm happy I was able to provide good questions for that which actually addressed several long standing problems (although the Wizards have gained the upper hand in the Season two timeline discontinuity.

I. On my own initiative e-mailing Bear McCreary and obtaining his permission for BattlestarWiki to post the lyrics to the soundtracks here.

3. Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past or do you feel other users have caused you stress? How have you dealt with it and how will you deal with it in the future?

A. After my last RFA, I Private Messaged Koenigrules and (I hope) worked things out, in private as opposed to dragging it through the public eye.

B. During the RFC for Shane, rather than preaching fire and brimstone I tried to be restrained and give Shane opportunity to reform his behavior. That could have gotten ugly but I think we handled it well, without having to have temporary bans or anything.