User talk:Extraordinary Writ

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By far the funniest and most clever Wikipedia page I randomly stumbled on. Kudos. The fish genuinely made me laugh out loud — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sumtimz I B Learnin (talk • contribs) 07:04, 27 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

First, thank you very much for the support in my RfA - I've always appreciated your work and insights a great deal; having you as an early supporter meant a lot.

Second, I'm interested in strengthening "professional" (cough) practice and looking at ways to support collegial learning over closures at AfD. It's not that I think there's any particular problems to address, but there doesn't seem to be much which analyses how we interpret the policies and guidelines with reference to our actual practice. There's a handful of closers right now who are very experienced, but how would we transfer knowledge should the proverbial happen? We run a monastic system of learning when it comes to closing AfDs ... or a kind of Grey's Inn lite without apprentices. Awhile ago I created a list of AfD discussions which were personally interesting to me: User:Goldsztajn/AfDs. As a starting point, I'm thinking to ask various admins who've participated regularly at AfD as closers to nominate 3-4 closures (or discussions) that they found particularly noteworthy - for whatever reason - shifting in the understanding of a particular policy or guideline, new thinking, unusual application of IAR etc complex OR/SYNTH debates. I'd be interested in putting together a list of 20-30 discussions that could form a sort of benchbook which could include commentary from those involved. I think building a set of comparisons over how we interpret key aspects of debates at AfD could act as a useful resource for those that come in the future (grouping could come under key thematics NPOL, SIGCOV, NLIST, GNG etc). I see this as operating in conjunction with Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Common outcomes, but whereas that is more focussed at the general community as a results summary, this would be more focussed at elaborating the methods of closure.

Another aspect could be deletion reviews - but I tend to think of that as a separate project.

Let me know your thoughts when you have time. Kind regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 10:24, 25 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Goldsztajn—and congratulations! (An RfA with a single-digit number of questions...it doesn't get much smoother than that.)

Ah, closures: the one topic guaranteed to send me off on an unsolicited wikiphilosophical tangent. Sometimes I like to think about the admin's role in terms of the old formalist-versus-realist debate. When I first got here I was a formalist, always thinking scrupulously about WP:ROUGHCONSENSUS and the policy/guideline distinction and the particular wording of P&Gs. (My !vote in the first discussion here comes to mind...the only time I've ever seen a DRV closer have to suggest, thoughtfully and politely, that we were all being a bunch of idiots.) With time, of course, I came to understand and even appreciate the more-or-less indeterminate nature of most of our guidelines, and sometimes that leaves me tempted by the realist devil on my shoulder, who says "most ambiguous AfDs have several defensible closures, so you can choose your own adventure as long as you couch it in the right kind of legitimating rhetoric".

I'm not sure I've ever fully made my peace with that divide. I don't do a ton of interesting closures, and when I do close against the numbers, it's often just for uncontroversial things like protecting the integrity of the process (two examples). Beyond that, it's really just the same familiar trade-offs again and again: global consensus vs. individualized exceptions; the letter vs. the (perceived) spirit; how freely to relist; how to treat late-arriving sources; different levels of aggressiveness in weighting !votes; and countless more specific issues. Neither the P&Gs nor the community as a whole give us many clear answers, so each closer draws the lines differently, and we're all usually upheld at DRV as long as long as our closures are carefully worded and not too far "outside the box". Sometimes I still find the freedom a little frightening. (At least I can always step back and do speedy deletions, where it's okay to be by-the-book...)

Anyways, returning to your original question: I can think of some areas where what you describe could be really useful, like WP:ATDs, where there are some unspoken rules not obvious in the policy itself. In general, though, it would probably just depend on the particular discussions that were selected. I think you'd be right to focus on closures that are "noteworthy" rather than ideal: it'd be good to just give people a sense of the various (analytical and rhetorical) tools in the closer's toolbox. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 12:41, 26 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/AutoWikiBrowser has a serious backlog, myself included, spanning from March 18th, I saw you have done it before, if it is no worry, can you do some of the requests? If not its fine, I don't mean to be a pistol either, but I just see its a huge backlog! Thanks, Valorrr ^{(lets chat)} 22:27, 5 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Extraordinary Writ, Hey I see you approved/denied everyone elses, but not mine? It seems like you missed mine or something? If you can, can you please review it? Thanks, Valorrr ^{(lets chat)} 02:29, 6 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Didn't forget; just had to step away. Looking now... Extraordinary Writ (talk) 07:14, 6 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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But I've reapplied and so many others are awaiting at Auto Wiki Browser requests, and If possible can you review them all? :) Valorrr ^{(lets chat)} 01:27, 20 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I prefer to let re-requests be evaluated by a different admin, just as a matter of fairness. But I can at least take care of some of the other requests so that there's less of a backlog for you. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 04:11, 20 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, might take some time, you are really the only one that does them, I'd be fine if you would re-eval but its completely your choice! Valorrr ^{(lets chat)} 16:16, 20 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like Pppery has taken care of it. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 17:06, 20 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

How do i create a page? --Seb123098 (talk) 16:37, 21 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Seb123098. You can use the Article Wizard, which will walk you through the various steps. But most new editors find creating an article from scratch to be pretty challenging, in part because of the complex rules on which topics are even eligible for an article (see this page for an overview). Oftentimes people find it easier to get experience working on existing articles first. If you do decide to go ahead with a new article, let me know what (or who) you want to write about and I'd be happy to give you more specific advice. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 09:02, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Seb123098 (talk) 17:29, 23 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:25, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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