The Sims Wiki:Requests for special positions

__NOWYSIWYG__

This is the page where requests for special positions are filed and heard. See this page for a list of special positions and their requirements. Receiving a special position does not automatically provide rollback or administrator privileges - these must be requested separately.

LostInRiverview
Position: Community Director I,, am applying for Community Director on The Sims Wiki. Through this position, I hope to take a leadership role in building the wiki community.

Before I ask for your support, I want to give you all an idea of what I have in mind for this position. I also want to give you all the chance to ask me any questions or raise any concerns you may have. Before we get into that, though, I want to give you an idea of the goal I'm aiming for.

My goal is quite simple: to make The Sims Wiki the best source of Sims information out there, and to build a strong, friendly and active group of contributors here who will serve as experienced, knowledgeable curators of our collective knowledge about The Sims. It is not enough for us to simply compile the information we know about the games; the information must also be tended, kept clean and orderly, straightened-up and polished when needed, and made to grow as more and more content is released. This can be done most effectively when we have a dedicated group of users involved in the community, who are able to work together and who each have a personal stake in the success of the wiki and in improving it. I see the Community Director role to be an important part in this goal.

Right now, I feel that the TSW community is fractured, quiet, and timid. In a wiki that is meant to operate on community consensus, consensus seems elusive and at times feels impossible to achieve, not because we disagree, but because so many of us are simply not engaged. There are precious few places on the wiki to talk with other users, and those places that do exist seem to have designated purposes that prevent effective dialog from developing: Community Discussions tends towards "concensus-track" matters, like policy proposals; Development Portal talk is geared more towards wiki operations, or the "nuts and bolts" of what makes things work on a technical level; and wiki news blogs are geared more towards providing information than fostering discussion. Finally, so much of the community seems to stand silent out of fear; fear that they may take action when action is prohibited, fear that they may upset an administrator or otherwise act contrary to what we admins wish, or fear that they may make the "wrong" decision when given the choice. I've seen so many users step back from any attempt to make decisions, declaring that "an admin should weigh in," and accepting at face value the flawed premise that administrative opinions should carry more weight or are somehow more valid.

With this in mind, here are a few of the items on my agenda:
 * I want to create new and accessible ways for users to communicate with each other about matters related to the wiki. I also want to devise a way to allow users to notify other users of useful information, relevant discussions, or other matters.
 * I want to push our community to improve the pages and resources we currently host. This can be achieved in a number of ways, but my main ideas are a revival and jump-start of wiki projects, the establishment of some "peer review" process for canon articles, and an article rating system to augment the Featured Article selection process. These are all ideas that have been floated on the wiki at one point or another but that have failed to gain any sort of traction; my goal is to push this out of the mud and get us moving towards some achievable goals.
 * I want to overhaul how we handle featured content, so that it is more accessible and appealing to new users, unregistered users, and mobile users.
 * I want to spearhead a movement to make our wiki more mobile-ready. This would include a push to update pages that display poorly on mobile devices (such as pages containing tables), and more work on curating content for the various Wikia mobile apps. It's time we accept that mobile is the future and, as such, we should be doing everything we can to accommodate mobile users and make it as easy as possible for them to find the information they need.

I want to say that, if selected for this role, I will aggressively and boldly implement these ideas and others in the spirit of improving the community. I will not, however, defy community consensus or act in a way that I feel is contrary to the wishes of the community at large. Additionally, I will hold myself accountable to any user who feels that I have overstepped the bounds or have acted in such a way, and will encourage any user, at any time, to raise any issues with me directly without fear of reprisal. My goal is to help get so many of this wiki's initiatives moving again, and doing that may require a heavier hand than is normal. I want to make clear that I have no intention of "taking over" anything, and that I will respond to any concerns that anyone has about my actions.

So at this point, I'd love to have some additional questions about what I've spoken about, or about how I'll utilize this position if given the opportunity to serve.

Thank you for the consideration,

 LiR talk • blog  •  contribs 03:41, November 14, 2015 (UTC)

K6ka
Position: IRC Contact

Hi, I'd like to nominate to be the new IRC contact. For those who don't know what that means, upon the success of this nomination he would be getting some additional userrights on IRC in correspondence with everything else that bureaucrats have.

I feel that all of K6ka's positive traits speak loudly without me having to explain it for you. You all made him a 'crat very recently. All I can say in addition that is relevant to this particular position is that he's highly active on IRC, he knows his way around it and he's always willing to help others out where he can. Given that he's already a bureaucrat, he already has most of the rights associated with this position anyway and I feel that he's a fantastic choice to take the reigns of IRC contact from myself.

Furthermore given recent events, i.e. Uncyclopedia's spammer leaking into #wikia-sims among countless other channels, it's probably for the best that somebody as closely associated with the community as K6ka is given my old rights mainly to provide some peace of mind. You should all know by now that I wouldn't be typing all of this out if I didn't believe that making K6ka the new IRC contact was the right idea and, given that he accepts this nomination, I am confident that the rest of the community believes in him like I do.

So with all this in mind, once he accepts (or declines) the nomination then we can get voting/discussing/whatever. 23:37, February 22, 2015 (UTC)


 * After three days of breathing and sleeping on this thought, I would like to accept this nomination to become IRC contact. Forgive me if my IRC skills are not up to par with other, more experienced ops, but since I seldom ever have to use my tools, and since we have three ops that are far more experienced with IRC than any of our on-wiki admins, and since Lab is mostly retired, I guess I shall accept this position and keep the future of The Sims Wiki alive, rather than in a retiree's hands that hardly comes onto the wiki (I'm assuming that's Lab, unless he likes to drop in every day to see how we're messing up his beautiful wiki?). Anyways, thanks again, Lab, for nominating me. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  21:28, February 25, 2015 (UTC)
 * To be honest the IRC contact really hasn't got that much to do from a technical standpoint as they used to as there's a bunch of other ops, and even user flags management isnt that big of an issue as the other bureaucrats can also do this. To me its more of a question of looking after the channel, and acting as a trusted link between the wiki and the IRC community. There's no rule that states you need to be 100% proficient at IRC to have these rights, and appointing a wiki bureaucrat to this position is absolutely fine by me, especially one who is as active as you.
 * K6ka is pretty active on the IRC channel and has no problems in handling the op flags. I fully trust that he would be able to take up this position well enough. He already knows what he's doing and it would be very beneficial to have an IRC contact due to the recent trolls coming in and out. ~ Beds (talk - blog ) 10:19, February 26, 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure if we need an official voting procedure for this nomination. Or is it already starting? Either way, I support K6ka's nomination. I don't often join the IRC channel, but I know I can trust K6ka for this position.  Nikel  Talk  –  Vote!  03:14, February 27, 2015 (UTC)

Approved -  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 14:31, July 3, 2015 (UTC)

DanPin
Position:Social Media Representative

I'd like to nominate myself for the position of Social Media Representative. I am active on the Wiki, at least on the IRC channel. I am in good standing with the community, given that I am already the Ombudsman, and I have been an administrator before. I also have accounts on the social platforms the Wiki's a part of (Facebook, Twitter and Steam), so I know how to work with them.

I thank you in advance for reviewing this request. 14:34, July 3, 2015 (UTC)


 * Strong support - Dan is an active member on social media, and on the wiki. He has also voiced his opinion in some community discussions and is not only appreciated, but he is liked amongst the community. He has my full support as a Social Media Rep. ~ Beds  (talk - blog ) 14:49, July 3, 2015 (UTC)


 * I think it's about time we took these positions seriously and filled them up. While Danny hasn't been very active on-wiki lately he is very active on IRC. Having someone who looks after the wiki's social media accounts will be beneficial to the wiki's public image. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  15:06, July 3, 2015 (UTC)


 * Support - Beds has covered a lot of this already, but I'll add on a bit. Dan will be able to help us increase engagement on Social Media and get our message out there. He is a former administrator as well, so he can be trusted to handle the controls effectively. -  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 15:06, July 3, 2015 (UTC)
 * Support - While Dan doesn't do that much on wiki anymore I think he'd be a great candidate, since he's active on IRC and knows how to, and regularly uses, social media stuff as is (and recently redesigned our twitter page). I'd be more than happy for him to be a representative of the community.

Given the positive response here, this application is approved. -  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 02:48, July 6, 2015 (UTC)

TheOneFootTallBrickWall
Position: Community Director

I would like to add myself TheOneFootTallBrickWall (talk) 09:18, July 21, 2015 (UTC) as Community Directer... I know i may not have edits but I know lots of things about the sims. I am helpful. I never act in bad faith and Im always on. Please at least consider me. It would make my life. ;-) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TheOneFootTallBrickWall (talk • contribs) 09:18, July 21, 2015 (UTC) - Please sign your comments with ~
 * Sorry but I'm going to be declining this for now. You're nowhere near experienced enough to be granted any position, this is only your 4th edit. I'd recommend you get a bit more experience and build up a name for yourself and then re-request at a later date.

C.Syde65
Position: Community Director

I would like to apply for the position of Community Director. I am very active on the Wiki, and well rounded in my contributions. I am in good standing with the community, given that I have rollback rights, and I have been selected as a Featured Editor twice. I also have administrator rights on several smaller wikis.

I am frequently active in the Sims wiki chat, and I'm somewhat active in the IRC channel. While I was initially reluctant to consider taking on this position, I have thought about it some more after reading up on what is expected of a user in this position. I am not easily offended by any opposition, and I will be more than happy to accept any constructive feedback.

I thank you advance for reviewing this request. I can understand if some are opposed to my request, but like I said, I am in good standing, and my experience has been quite useful, in helping out newer and less experienced users. ―  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 06:38, August 23, 2015 (UTC)
 * I am inclined to support your request. But, before I do make that official, I'd like to ask a couple questions. What do you see as being some of the roles of a Community Director? Are there any particular tasks you'd like to undertake as the C.D. or any ideas you'd like to implement?


 * As I said, I'm inclined to support C.Syde, as we haven't had a C.D. in quite some time. Speaking to the candidate specifically, I think he is more than capable of handling this position and fulfilling its roles. I have every confidence that he will do the job well. --  LostInRiverview talk • blog  •  contribs 10:30, August 23, 2015 (UTC)


 * If there's any tasks I would like to undertake as the C.D., or anything that I would plan on doing, it would be managing some of the forums, because I have noticed that some of our forum questions in the past, such as this one should really have been paid more attention to. If there was a question I made that hadn't received answers from a sufficient number of users, then I would basically take matters into my own hands and choose how to add the information to those pages based on whatever information I had. Provided that the said information was accurate and I hadn't found any evidence that stated otherwise.


 * Other than that there's not really much else I can think of at this point, but I'm sure that there will be some other things that I would like to implement once I think of them. ―  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 10:59, August 23, 2015 (UTC)


 * Comment: Community Directors do not solely make the decisions on the wiki. You cannot implement things that you think are best for the wiki without at least a proper discussion. That's not how things are run around here. ~ Beds  (talk - blog ) 12:21, August 23, 2015 (UTC)


 * Comment - I understand that, and I'm perfectly aware of it. ―  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 03:26, August 24, 2015 (UTC)

Well, I have my reasons for this opposition. First of all, I don't see how being a CD would help in cases such as Forum:Bluewater Village townies with Nightlife clothing. C.Syde has frequently forumshopped for responses to his threads on chat and on IRC, and while I can see why C.Syde would do this, it's not something I would support, as pestering other people to partake in community discussions is more of an annoyance than it is beneficial. Secondly, I would like to see C.Syde more active on IRC. I am hesitant to support a CD that focuses little on this part of the wiki, especially considering that the channel is older and more mature than our on-wiki chat. Those who frequent IRC know little about C.Syde, and IRC is a part of our community, so I'd advise C.Syde to get to know the people on IRC better. Lastly, and this should be my strongest argument, a CD should [plan] and [direct] any special events and make announcements regarding community activities and updates. C.Syde hasn't even written a TSW News or TSP blog post, and I'm hesitant to support a CD that has to make special community announcements when they haven't written a weekly news blog. --I am  k6ka  Talk to me!   See what I have done  20:09, August 28, 2015 (UTC)


 * Comment - The reason I don't frequent IRC is mainly due to my poor IRC connection, which constantly causes errors forcing me to exit and reload IRC, which can be quite irritating. Also I haven't written any weekly news blogs because I'm sure I have a particularly strong concept as to exactly "what" a weekly news blog "must" include, and what they may include. I might have to practice writing a news blog before I consider signing up to write one. ―  C.Syde  ( talk &#124;  contribs ) 22:13, August 28, 2015 (UTC)

Due to the lack of response in over a month, I am closing this request. Since there was no consensus in favor of the applicant, the request will not be granted at this time. --  LostInRiverview ( Administrator)  • Contact me here • 01:28, October 9, 2015 (UTC)