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@Mz7, SQL, and GeneralNotability: First order of business for you guys is to get us 3 scrutineers and 1 or 2 reserves in case one needs to bow out.—CYBERPOWER (Trick or Treat) 00:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

Cyberpower678, Yep, working on getting linked up with the other two first, and those items will indeed be the first items on the docket. SQL^{Query me!} 01:22, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

• Shamelessly copied from last year

Long before the scrutineering period begins — when everyone yells at us "what are you doing/how long do I have to wait" — User:-revi/ACE scrutineering.

Personal remarks: Assisting scrutineers with finding socks blocked after their vote cast, or those voted twice with their known/declared alt accounts would be greatly appreciated. — regards, Revi 10:45, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

@-revi: thanks for the note. I believe there's a userscript/gadget that strikes through the usernames of indef blocked users, but I'm not sure it works with secure poll since it's on a different server. Either way, I think compiling a list of peri-election sock blocks for scrutineers sounds relatively easy. I'll put a not in my calendar to do so. — Wug·a·po·des​ 23:28, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

IIRC, personal JS doesn't work on votewiki to prevent malicious activity with scripts. And you are correct, there's one. — regards, Revi 13:18, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

I believe I have created all of the ACE pages. Did I miss anything?—CYBERPOWER (Message) 02:10, 27 August 2020 (UTC)

The top of the page still advertises Wikipedia:COORD19 as a shortcut link. I would have updated it and created the new link, but... in the faint hope that someone might concur, do we really need to have this short cut? I believe no page links to the 2019 shortcut other than election page itself. isaacl (talk) 06:12, 27 August 2020 (UTC)

Isaacl, it's not really about the fact that it's linked anywhere, it's about the fact that ACE is a multi-month process, and having the convenience of a shortcut during that time is better than not having one at all. —CYBERPOWER (Message) 11:47, 27 August 2020 (UTC)

All I'm saying is no one seems to have taken advantage of the shortcut on other pages. I suppose someone could have typed it in manually, but I don't think it's too likely. isaacl (talk) 17:14, 27 August 2020 (UTC)

Isaacl, I repeatedly typed it in last year during the elections. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 23:26, 27 August 2020 (UTC)

Enjoy then! isaacl (talk) 00:14, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

I've created the two outstanding 2020 candidate templates, please feel free to check my work. Primefac (talk) 22:29, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Is there any reason we don't have common templates for these where you fill in the year? e.g. ((Arbitration Committee candidate|2020)) (so that we don't have to make copies each year) GeneralNotability (talk) 22:51, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi. Just checking to make sure that someone has been in touch with the Office about having SecurePoll set up for the election. I assume this is taken care of, but one year no one remembered to do it and the election wound up being delayed, so just double-checking. Thanks, Newyorkbrad (talk) 17:09, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Newyorkbrad, with SQL on the commission, I’m sure he remembered. But if not, the commissioners are responsible for getting it set up. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 20:15, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Newyorkbrad - I have been in touch with the Office. SQL^{Query me!} 23:22, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:48, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm running a test on the listGen script to serve us a voter list. I would like to invite the coordinators to help scan the list for errors so this can be addressed before the real list needs to be submitted to SecurePoll.—CYBERPOWER (Trick or Treat) 21:03, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

• I'll take a look too, think I found most of the errors last time :) When generating it, please also note what parameters were used if they are not going to be the "final" parameters. — xaosflux ^Talk 21:06, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

  Xaosflux, parameters are final unless you say there is an issue with them. Last year we had great success with this script. Since all that is changed are the eligibility time stamps, I don’t expect an issue. —CYBERPOWER (Trick or Treat) 00:36, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

  Xaosflux, I posted the preliminary list at WP:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Coordination/SecurePoll. —CYBERPOWER (Trick or Treat) 11:42, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

  The list options are:

  • Include blocked (managed by SecurePoll)
  • Do not exclude bot/doppelgaenger/deceased/ACE optout categories (handled by Scrutineers/SecurePoll)
  • Exclude inactive
  • Format for SecurePoll
  • Filter out flagged bots

  Configuration set to:

  • Registration deadline: October 1, 2020
  • Voting start: November 23, 2020
  • Voting end: December 6, 2020 23:59:59
  • Edit count requirement deadline: November 1, 2020
  • Activity period: 1 year from registration deadline
  • Edit count requirement: 150
  • Edit count qualifying namespaces: 0
  • Activity edit count requirement: 10
  • Activity edit count qualifying namespaces: all —CYBERPOWER (Trick or Treat) 11:49, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

  @Cyberpower678: now that it is November, can you rerun this for what will presumably be the master list? — xaosflux ^Talk 03:08, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

  Xaosflux, You can't call any list a master list until shortly up until the actual voting period for a number reasons.

  1. Users may rename themselves between now and then.
  2. Live contributions may get deleted and may disqualify a user from being eligible to vote.

  With that being said, I posted an updated list, and don't expect to see a significant change as we approach the voting period. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 16:00, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

  @Cyberpower678: of course, but thank you! — xaosflux ^Talk 16:28, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

• @Cyberpower678: I've posted some formatted lists, linked here: Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Coordination/SecurePoll/formated. Couple of questions, I expect we end up with 2 lists still, the voter rolls, and then the messaging list - of which the messaging list is a subset of the rolls. I expect this is a list of the roll, but it seems a bit inconsistent unless I'm missing something? "Filter out flagged bots", for this - while I believe we have actually done this before, does the RfC's actually support excluding someone from using their bot account for voting? If so, is it actually specific that only bots with a bot flag are in there? Also, as far as the rolls go, is there an RfC that supports excluding those in deceased users from the rolls - or just from the messaging? What brought this up was a first glance review of the list with some entries that seem to be off a bit with the exact lists you had above (and what is an ACE optout category that removes someone from the rolls?). Also some newly ineligible account classes appear to be present still (e.g. renamed user....) Example accounts: Hasteur, HasteurBot, MGA73bot, NetBot, Renamed user 9ff13960de57f6ee9b1a65311efbb0be. Please review and advise? — xaosflux ^Talk 17:08, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

  Xaosflux, There will always be two lists, one for SecurePoll, and one for MM, but they are generated by the same script. Filtering out flagged bot accounts has been done since we have done this historically and no RFC has overturned this. Only accounts with the bot flagged are filtered out. Filtering out the categories is only done for the MM lists. The ACE optout category was introduced last year for those that don’t want to be spammed with ACE messages. As for renamed user, that is an oversight and I will fix this. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 17:55, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

  @Cyberpower678: ok thanks, just making sure this is the "voter rolls" list that should still included deceased users and unflagged bots and not exlude opt-out cat; please ping when refreshed. — xaosflux ^Talk 17:57, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

  Xaosflux, The list is updated. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:55, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

That’s what this list is.  :-) —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 18:04, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Cyberpower678, is the listgen source available anywhere? GeneralNotability (talk) 00:58, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

GeneralNotability, Sorry, but this code is a trade secret. I cannot reveal it to you. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 19:27, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

On 30 September 2020, WP:ACERFC2020#Order of candidate listing closed with the result that:

Candidates should be listed randomly on the candidates page (and any other WP-space pages), using coding magic that randomly reshuffles them each time the page is refreshed – once. It should then be saved to a cookie (when permitted by the browser) or otherwise state-saved to the extent possible and not randomized again for the same user (unless they do something that incidentally defeats this, like switching to another browser, etc.).

The Electoral Commission is researching potential technical implementations for this result, but unfortunately, at this time it is uncertain whether the functionality can be implemented in time for the current election. In the meantime, the status quo ante—in which we shuffle the candidates randomly on every page load—will continue to be in effect at the candidates page. Mz7 (talk) 00:24, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

This is something I raised with GN also, but just for the record, does it actually shuffle on every page load or on every page purge/null edit currently? The 2019 one, for example, only seems to shuffle when I edit/purge it. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 15:53, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

ProcrastinatingReader, that's a good clarification. Because of caching, indeed the candidate order may not reshuffle on every page load, but will on every purge/null edit. Mz7 (talk) 16:49, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

@Mz7: fwiw if you want it, you can add the page to User:ProcBot/PurgeList to achieve a similar effect (ie, force a purge every minute). ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 16:52, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm good with that. SQL, Mz7, any objections? GeneralNotability (talk) 17:07, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

That's fine with me. Mz7 (talk) 17:10, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. SQL^{Query me!} 17:46, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

@ProcrastinatingReader: Can you post the source code of the bot somewhere? – SD0001 (talk) 10:48, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

SD0001, why is the source code needed?—CYBERPOWER (Around) 12:15, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

It isn't needed, just piqued my curiosity how the bot works to be able to schedule purges over such small intervals while dynamically reading the list of pages from a wiki page. I don't mean to imply that PR could be doing something nefarious behind the scenes to tilt the election in favour of his preferred candidates! – SD0001 (talk) 14:59, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

SD0001, it could be storing a local copy of the processed page in a list and then only checking for changes to the page to update said cache? Though loading the page every X seconds/minutes doesn't seem too much. Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 15:14, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Dreamy Jazz, actually it literally just sends a purge request to Wikipedia every minute. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:08, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Was just thinking how the script determines what pages to purge, as opposed to how they are purged. Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 00:12, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Good question! I touched on this issue here (+ a 5th requirement: different types of purges). I was too lazy to over-engineer this and add in some fancy 'detecting changes to the page' functionality (which is slightly more complex than it first seemed iirc). The lazier solution I found is to realise that you can schedule the times absolutely (like how cron does it), rather than relatively (like you'd usually do in a process). A combination of the two becomes the simple solution: a process which runs tasks like a cron schedule. Hence the "changes may take up to 15 minutes to register" caveat noted at User:ProcBot/PurgeList -- I literally just restart the process with a fresh read of the purge list every 15 mins (obviously allowing already running tasks to finish), with a small time offset to prevent double executions. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 17:30, 14 November 2020 (UTC)

I know it always starts slow... but it seems really slow this time around. Is it time to spam AN and other noticeboards? Beeblebrox (talk) 23:18, 14 November 2020 (UTC)

I don't see anything in the rules that prevents you from running again and having two seats. Natureium (talk) 00:00, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

I posted at WP:AN and WT:ACN. If it's any consolation: according to User:SQL/AceStatsByDay, around this time in 2016, we also only had 2 nominations, and another 7 came in the last three days. Mz7 (talk) 01:50, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

At Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020#Late nominations - why do candidates wait? I've started what will hopefully be an exploration of why the bulk of nominations come very late and what, if anything can (or should) be done to reduce it? Thryduulf (talk) 13:23, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

That page doesn't appear to be being updated as names are added. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:40, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

Updated. Its not automatically updated, so I've added the three not already there. Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 19:55, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

When the page Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Questions was initially set up, it included a typo that specified the question limit as three questions per editor. Per the result of WP:ACERFC2020, the limit is actually two questions per editor for each candidate. The typo was fixed earlier today, and I have added a note at the top of every question page (plus the template) clarifying this. However, if you have already exhausted your two questions and were unaware of this new limit, the Electoral Commission is willing to consider requests for exemptions from the limit. Feel free to ask in this section if, for example, you would like to ask a third question of a candidate. Thanks, Mz7 (talk) 21:57, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

This is a purely procedural question, but how are the Scrutineers actually picked? Like who actually chooses them, what is the process? I know they're obviously Stewards from other home Wikis and all that, but they usually just seem to pop up. I've been involved in the Elections for a few years now, and I'm just confused how they're appointed behind the scenes, and I don't actually see any process for choosing Scrutineers articulated anywhere. Can anyone clarify? ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 01:36, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

The motion from ArbCom this year seems to indicate that the scrutineers were selected "On recommendation of the Electoral Commission". The actual recruitment seems to have occured here: m:Stewards'_noticeboard#Enwiki_ArbCom_election_scrutineer_request. Best, Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 01:39, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Swarm, we requested volunteers at the Stewards' Noticeboard on Meta, and three people volunteered. Selection between volunteers (if there are more than needed) is by consensus of the electoral commission, as I understand it. This is on my running list of things to document. GeneralNotability (talk) 01:57, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

I've been trying to take notes at User:Mz7/Running Arbitration Committee elections, and a few days ago I added a section for scrutineer selection. Feel free to tweak or add to it as necessary. Mz7 (talk) 02:51, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Thanks everyone! So basically, volunteers are solicited in an informal manner on the Stewards' Noticeboard, and then are appointed by Arbcom "on the recommendation of the EC". Got it. Now, I'm not trying to needlessly stir the pot, but hear me out. This seems like a de facto process that just happens the way it happens, and there's really nothing concrete wrong with it. However, it seems to me that the elections are supposed to be independent of Arbcom, so Arbcom's role in "authorizing" the Scrutineers doesn't really make sense. The scrutineers already have the required CU permissions, and they already have an authorization of their scope that has been articulated by the community. So I'm not sure why Arbcom needs to play any role in appointing or "authorizing" the Scrutineers, who have already been appointed by the global community, and then have been further appointed by the EC, which has itself been granted authority over the election by the local community. Perhaps it might make sense to document and articulate a clear process for choosing scrutineers. I would say give the EC the responsibility of choosing and appointing the Scrutineers, and once appointed they will inherently have the authorization to use their existing CU permissions as is already authorized by the community in the Scrutineer instructions. Arbcom should probably not be involved in certifying election officials in an election that is a nominally independent community process. Just throwing ideas around! It would of course have to be formalized in an ACE RfC, but I think it makes sense! ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 03:10, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Swarm, I believe the need to have Arbcom appoint them stems from the requirements laid out at meta:CheckUser_policy#Appointing_local_Checkusers. SQL^{Query me!} 03:19, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

I don't see anything in that policy that dictates or even implies that Arbcom needs to appoint CUs. It only says that Arbcoms may directly appoint CUs in lieu of the local community. Nothing there states that if a local community pre-authorizes Stewards to use their CU permissions within a certain scope, it's required that the local Arbcom approves it. I think the status quo of our local CU policy is that local CU access is granted by our Arbcom, and that explains the current status quo, but there's nothing inherent that prohibits the community from granting CU access for the sole purpose of ACE elections without Arbcom approving it. It only makes sense for ACE CUs to have community-granted CU approval, rather than Arbcom-granted CU approval. I don't think this is a contentious thing that the community would oppose. It's within our rights according to global CU policy, even if our current local policy abdicates all of these rights to Arbcom. Nothing is preventing the community from making a minor change that empowers Scrutineers to exercise their permissions without the pre-approval of Arbcom, when they're literally overseeing an Arbcom election. It only makes sense to transfer this procedural authority in this limited context to the community, rather than letting it rest with Arbcom, when it's Arbcom elections they're overseeing. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 03:49, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

It's an interesting idea, and I agree that the ArbCom motion is purely procedural—it only exists because of the technicality that stewards can't run CU on enwiki without permission from ArbCom (except in "emergencies"). We should add your idea as something to discuss at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee Elections December 2021 (i.e. the pre-election RfC usually held in September). Mz7 (talk) 03:58, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Agreed, it's a question that should be put forth in the next ACE RfC. Worst case scenario, nothing changes, and the status quo remains. Still, I think it's not particularly contentious for the community to take over the authority of appointing the ACE CU permissions, which it in effect already has, save for the procedural aspect of Arbcom having this sole technical authority to do so. Just "X" Arbcom out of the equation for ACE, and nothing will change, but it will uplift the notion of ACE being an independent process. Hopefully I or someone else will remember to slip this technicality in for next year! ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 04:07, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

In the interest of reducing the size of next year's arbitration committee elections RfC, perhaps this modification to the local check user policy could be proposed earlier? I think it's sufficiently independent of any other aspects of the election process that it can be done on its own. isaacl (talk) 05:07, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Hmm, I don't think this issue is that particularly important; I would keep it in the usual RfC. Just to keep things focused, I would ask that at the very least further discussion of this question be postponed till after the current election is over. Mz7 (talk) 05:18, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

I don't think it's very urgent, either, and agree it can wait for a while. But given the unwieldiness of this year's RfC, I think it would be good to try to separate standalone proposals. isaacl (talk) 06:25, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Swarm, beware that if you select community election way, you will need 25 people to vote + 70~80% in support of them (with at least 7 days minimum time) for each of the scrutineers before you can ask for flags at m:SRP. That means, you will need to get things done sooner than previous time. — regards, Revi 10:39, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

(←) @-revi: Based on the meta CU policy, I'm under the impression that a local community has the full authority to authorize CUs. The enwiki community has already pre-authorized Scrutineers to use their CU permissions within the predefined scope of the Scrutineer position. So my impression is that the community has the right to allow Stewards to use their existing CU access on enwiki at its leisure, and that if the community were to specifically affirm this CU usage then additional "rights-granting" processes would not be needed. I believe the community has already authorized this, it's just a matter of specifying and clarifying the fact that Arbcom need not intervene. Of course, this is all contingent on the community's consent to a generalized approval for CU access for any Scrutineers, but I feel that if the community specifically approves general CU access for EC-appointed Scrutineers, then that will satisfy any and all policy requirements. Thoughts? ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 04:10, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

@Swarm: Such a provision may well be inconsistent with the Stewards policy (m:S), which provides that The use of steward rights is restricted by policy; stewards will not use their technical access when there are local users who can use that access, except in emergencies, and with the global CheckUser policy (m:CU), which provides that If local CheckUsers exist in a project, checks should generally be handled by those. In emergencies, or for multi-project CheckUser checks (as in the case of cross-wiki vandalism), stewards may perform local checks. This suggests that in order to use CU access on enwiki outside of an emergency/crosswiki situation, stewards must be granted local CU access by the community, which triggers the 25-vote requirement. To be honest, I really don't think this is an issue right now that requires a change. I can't see any ArbCom outright refusing to appoint the scrutineers designated by the electoral commission. (If it ever did, I suspect that we would not only be talking about appointing scrutineers but also creating policy to allow recalling the committee that so refused!) It's just so far outside the realm of plausibility given the way Wikipedia works now that I don't see how it's worth it to create this process where the current rubber-stamping will do just fine. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 19:01, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

My take on the CU policy and Stewards policy is basically same as Kevin - that 1. We are only authorized to enter enwiki CU/OS only if there's true emergency (also locally authorized by WP:GRP#S) or 2. we are specifically authorized to enter, be it community or ArbCom. I don't think we will take blanket approvals; the approvals should be tied to one person. Note that we really don't want to enter enwiki, dewiki, and other big wikis without a rubber stamp, because people will be furious at us for interfering the local process (remember the FramGate?) and that guarantees the removal of next confirmation round. — regards, Revi 17:42, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

I was thinking that, theoretically, it may be possible if we update Wikipedia:Global rights policy § Stewards, which is the local policy that already allows stewards to use very specific parts of their steward access on English Wikipedia (i.e. global rollback, viewing deleted revisions, username suppression). However, I acknowledge that this approach to granting CU access would be unprecedented, and I'm also sympathetic to Kevin and Revi's view that the status quo is not so problematic that it's worth going through the trouble of changing (i.e. if it ain't broke, don't fix it).

With all of this being said, I would like to reiterate my request that further discussion on this issue be either postponed until after the election or moved to a different location, since it's not really relevant to this election. Mz7 (talk) 21:14, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

• @-revi: I agree, it's unsteady ground to tread on based on a mere interpretation of existing policy. However, my thought is posing the specific authorization of Scrutineers to the community, with the Scrutineers being chosen for a predefined, limited role, by the Electoral Commission, which is itself directly appointed by the community. I find it hard to believe that the Stewards would reject a specific directive given to them by a community, in favor of some fabricated need for Arbcom approval. And I really don't buy into Kevin's declaration that "it's not worth it to create this process". No one's proposing a new process. It's just a simple question as to whether the community can appoint CUs for this specific purpose. It's a yes-or-no question. If the answer is "yes", it's not a new process, it's just eliminating the current process in favor of an automatic procedural authorization. I'm not sympathetic to procedural gerrymandering to try to suggest that our local community does not have the right to approve CU access as we see fit, and that seems to be what the three above users are arguing. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 04:19, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020

 – Mz7 (talk) 04:35, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

I suggest that S Marshall's repeated questioning of Bradv on the same topic is out of line, and their most recent question be removed. The question has been answered, and the repeated questions (now at 4, effectively asking the same question each time) violate the new guideline Any editor may only ask a limited number of questions to the candidate, and may ask a reasonable number of follow-up questions. In the event of a dispute about what constitutes a reasonable follow-up question, Electoral Commissioners have final say in resolving the dispute. There is consensus to impose the same limit as on RfA, the limit on questions will be set at 2. (apologies to the commissioners if this should be on some other talk page) power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:09, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

power~enwiki, acknowledging on behalf of ElectCom that we've seen this and are looking into it. I think the correct place is Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2020/Coordination, but no worries, I will move this thread there later. GeneralNotability (talk) 04:20, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

@2020 ACE Commissioners: ping the rest here. KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 04:22, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

• You'd expect an Arbcom candidate to be able to demonstrate an understanding of content policy; to take responsibility for their decisions; and to deal graciously with challenging questions. I wouldn't repeat the same question four times at RFA, but here? Absolutely. I think I should be allowed to keep asking until the candidate gives a straight answer that doesn't hide behind process.—S Marshall T/C 04:34, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
  • I think I should be allowed to keep asking until the candidate gives a straight answer What? No. Candidates aren't obliged to answer questions in the first place, and you certainly re not allowed to filibuster the process until you get your satisfaction. Repeating the same question over and over again, especially when we instituted a limit on questions, is a textbook example of disruption and I suggest you re-evaluate your approach. — Wug·a·po·des​ 04:39, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
  • First, the idea that arbitrators owe the community endless explanations is part of our unhealthy discourse around arbcom. I think Wugapodes puts it well by suggesting S Marshall re-evaluate his approach. Second, I do need to point out that Brad has demonstrated an understanding of the content policy and it's S Marshall who has gotten the situation wrong. If this were at AN or ANI, I would start looking into S Marhsall's other move to see if it warranted removing page mover as a boomerang. Which would be a shame since my past experiences with him around RfCs and at DRV has been postive. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 04:47, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
    • My intention is certainly not to disrupt, but to raise questions about the candidate's actions and history of placing process above content policy, which with all due respect for Barkeep49, I cannot agree was correctly applied in thus case. I am of course happy to explain my page moves at any time and provide a link to the consensus I was enforcing when I did so. There was a brief time when I made page moves after that consensus had been repealed, but before I was aware of the repeal. I will not need page mover again so you're welcome to take it away in punishment for my shocking impertinence, if you're so minded.—S Marshall T/C 05:01, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

      I know your intention isn't to disrupt, so I was really only agreeing with the re-evaluating the approach part. And we're not at ANI or An so I have no intention of removing your permission (and wouldn't have done it on this basis alone). I'm don't believe in punishing editors and I'm not terribly excited about taking actions against a good editor like you (as I wouldn't consider the removal a punishment, though understand how it could feel that way which is why I wouldn't be excited about it). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 05:21, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

• There seems to be some discrepancy as to the outcome of WP:ACERFC2020 with respect to the question limit. Cyberpower678 closed WP:ACERFC2020 with the statement that power~enwiki quoted above, but when Cyberpower678 set up the questions page a few days later, he added You may not ask more than 3 questions to the list of instructions (see Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Questions). It would be helpful if Cyberpower678 could clarify whether he meant to close with a 2-question limit or a 3-question limit. If it is not clear, then I would use the 3-question limit since it is the most conservative change. Mz7 (talk) 04:44, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

  Mz7, same as RfA which is 2 questions if I’m not mistaken. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 12:21, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

1. Yes, the consensus was clearly for the same as WP:RFA which states "There is a limit of two questions per editor, with relevant follow-ups permitted. The two-question limit cannot be circumvented by asking questions that require multiple answers (e.g. asking the candidate what they would do in each of five scenarios).". Thryduulf (talk) 13:16, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

• Very well. My questions were relevant follow ups, but it is clear that the clerks don't wish to permit them. I have removed the unanswered one.—S Marshall T/C 14:01, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
• All right, the unanswered question is withdrawn, and since there was confusion around the number of permitted questions I have no problem with leaving the existing three (but will go update all of the documentation to say two). I think we're all set here. GeneralNotability (talk) 16:42, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

  I don't see the point of collapsing it with a note. Please either leave it up in such a condition that I can reply to it, or remove it from the page completely. – bradv🍁 16:47, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

  Bradv, for clarity: the original question was withdrawn (which was good), but then after I made my comment above I noticed that the question had been replaced with an off-topic comment that I opted to hat. I'll remove it. GeneralNotability (talk) 17:27, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

• That was totally on topic, and self-evidently so, but of course, you can't possibly let the little people have the last word, can you? The clerks must ensure the candidate speaks last. The alternative would be chaos! Anarchy!—S Marshall T/C 12:14, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
  • The purpose of the candidate question page is to (a) ask candidates questions, and (b) for candidates to answer those questions. Everything else is off-topic so why would anyone other than the candidate have the "last word"? If you want to make general comments about candidates there are plenty of other venues for that. Thryduulf (talk) 13:16, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
    • I'm surprised at you, Thryduulf: this is unlike you. General comments would certainly belong elsewhere; but of course, that wasn't one, was it? It was a specific discussion of the adequacy of the candidate's response, in the place where they made it. To contend that it was off-topic is surely a stretch. Is it the clerks' role to protect the candidate?—S Marshall T/C 15:06, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

      So, this is actually a new rule this year following the result at WP:ACERFC2020#CandidateQs3a, which Thryduulf proposed. Per that discussion, Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Candidates/Bradv would be the more suitable location for analysis of the candidate's question answers, rather than the actual questions page itself. Mz7 (talk) 18:19, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

      • • I'm seeing: Content explicitly permitted on questions to candidates page is: .... Short responses to answers by the person asking the question (e.g. thanks). Mine was a short response, if not a thanks.—S Marshall T/C 18:43, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
          • Note that "Analysis of candidates, questions or answers" is explicitly prohibited though. I read your comment as an analysis of the answer. Thryduulf (talk) 18:58, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

First I'll note that

Self-nomination period is (from Sunday 00:00, 08 November 2020 (UTC) until Tuesday 23:59, 17 November 2020 (UTC) and that there are now only 5 candidates for 7 seats and one day left. May I suggest that you leave the nominations open until there are at least 8 candidates, or voting actually begins?

The Signpost intends to have something this year about ArbCom elections before they are over, but our publication schedule combined with the schedule for the elections makes it difficult. We'll publish on Sunday, November 29, which is after voting starts, but gives our reader a week until voting ends. A couple of things I've ruled out 1. no endorsements and 2. the SP editor-in-chief will not run for election for ArbCom. That was tried once before and didn't work out so well. Given the circumstances this year it would be especially ill-advised :-)

I suppose we might just summarize the rules and voting period, but that would just take a couple of links. Maybe just summarize each candidate's initial statement in xxx words. Not very exciting, but it would help some voters. If anybody has other suggestions, please let me know. Or if there are any special election rules that say we can't do something (e.g. I believe that making endorsements based on a group of editors opinions would be one) also let me know.

Any help appreciated.

Smallbones_(smalltalk) 17:29, 16 November 2020 (UTC) (editor-in-chief)

The election RFC made it so the deadline for the end of nominations is a hard deadline and all parts of the process must be completed by the deadline. However it also made provision that In the event of significant technical or other issues affecting the election, the election commissioners may adjust the deadline of the affected part(s) of the election process, and/or any subsequent parts, by a commensurate amount. It is up to the commissioners to determine whether a shortage of candidates is a "significant issue". Thryduulf (talk) 18:56, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

@SQL, Mz7, and GeneralNotability: what is the SecurePoll ID?—CYBERPOWER (Around) 01:58, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Cyberpower678, 808. GeneralNotability (talk) 01:59, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Not to be confused with the Roland TR-808, a drum machine whose ease of use, affordability, and then-state-of-the-art programmable drum rhythms revolutionized contemporary music. — Wug·a·po·des​ 02:05, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

GeneralNotability, that ID appeared to be invalid. Fortunately I was able to look it up and it’s actually 752 —CYBERPOWER (Message) 02:27, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm looking on votewiki and its pages are definitely at Special:SecurePoll/(function)/808... GeneralNotability (talk) 02:29, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

This is a bit of a technical quirk: even though they're the same election, the vote IDs are different on enwiki and votewiki. While on votewiki it's 808, on enwiki it's 752. Mz7 (talk) 02:33, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Mz7, and GeneralNotability, no worries. The correct ID is in place now and all links point to the yet to be opened poll. Speaking of, JSutherland (WMF) (talk · contribs) has been made aware of the voter list located at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Coordination/SecurePoll. I will be updating it periodically from now through the start of the voting period, including once more shortly before the vote starts. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 14:39, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, that's my bad, sorry - I forgot there were two IDs. :) And yeah, please ping me again when there is the final list of voters and we'll get that imported (there's not much point in continuing to update over time really). Joe Sutherland (WMF) (talk) 16:44, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

When is voting actually meant to start? There is a mismatch between the date and the day of the week on WP:ACE2020. I assume by the counter in the box at the top of the page it's supposed to be Monday. -- Amanda (aka DQ) 16:51, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

AmandaNP, the template seems to just copy the information which was posted a day earlier from the page. The 2020 page was created by copying (and then changing) the 2019 page. The 2019 page has "Tuesday 00:00, 19 November 2019" as the start of the voting. Because the days of the week are all the same comparing 2019 to 2020, it might be that date is incorrect and the day of the week is correct. Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 16:57, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

I mean, I'll take the extra day to finish my guide if I can have it :D -- Amanda (aka DQ) 17:01, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

:). I'll ping GeneralNotability as they are a commissioner and Mz7 as the creator of the page, as they should know what to do / who to ask to find out the correct date. Probably best that this is all correct asap so that everyone knows when the voting will start. Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 17:05, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Dreamy_Jazz - It does look like a mistake to me. We'll get it fixed. SQL^{Query me!} 17:35, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Voting traditionally starts on a Tuesday, specifically so that the WMF staff is available for SecurePoll - looks like a date error, so yes lets get the commissioners to rule on this ASAP. — xaosflux ^Talk 17:31, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

And - this will mean having to fix the SecurePoll configs. — xaosflux ^Talk 17:32, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Xaosflux -  Done - [1] SQL^{Query me!} 17:39, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

@SQL you also removed the label for support votes - votewiki:Special:Diff/1196 - was this intentional? Or is it phab:T264479? DannyS712 (talk) 04:46, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

DannyS712 - it wasn't there to begin with (at least, didn't appear on the form to us - we brought this up a few days ago with WMF), we're told it's a bug and will be manually inserted into the DB. SQL^{Query me!} 12:18, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

• N.B. This also calls for scrutineering to start on Tuesday , 3 December (which is a Thursday - and before the end of the voting period). — xaosflux ^Talk 17:37, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

  @Xaosflux: - Mz7 has fixed that (and the data template), and GeneralNotability has reached out to WMF and updated them. We should be good at this point SQL^{Query me!} 17:46, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

• This was my fault. I incorrectly set the date as 23 November when I first created the WP:ACE2020 page back in August. To be clear, the actual voting start date is Tuesday, 24 November 2020. Thanks AmandaNP for catching this discrepancy, and I apologize sincerely for the confusion. The other electoral commissioners and I have updated all of the election pages to reflect this corrected date. Mz7 (talk) 17:53, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Mz7: You may wish to specify if that is UTC or whatever time zone. Where I live, for example, the date is not the same as in the US. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:37, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Kudpung, I believe the main elections page (Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020) specifies UTC; for the sake of clarity, it is indeed 24 Nov 2020 at 00:00 UTC (that is, immediately following the rollover from 23 to 24 Nov) GeneralNotability (talk) 00:44, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

• Good to hear its all been clarified. Thanks all for the assistance with this. Dreamy Jazz ^{talk to me | my contributions} 00:46, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

• Not that it matters, but I always remember voting at on Sunday nights in North America multiple years in a row (so I suppose midnight on Monday UTC.) Not sure where the Tuesday came from. Not really a complaint, just that I don't think there's been an established tradition of Tuesday. I think we kinda just went with whatever the template said and worked it out as needed. Motto of this story: whomever rolls forward the template decides the date, so volunteer to roll it forward if you have a preferences TonyBallioni (talk) 03:15, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
  • From what I recall, there was an issue with SecurePoll in 2018 that required WMF staff to fix, so the election was delayed by a day so they wouldn't need to work on the weekend. Then that change was carried over to 2019 so we again wouldn't require support staff on the weekend in case of a problem. And now it is a tradition that the election starts on a Tuesday UTC. – bradv🍁 03:50, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
    • Well, last year there wasn't any discussion at all about it, in private among the election commission or from what I could find on-wiki, we just went with whatever was on the page. My point was to note for future commissions that if this is an issue that comes up next year (say it gets put on a Wednesday) it isn't something they need to "fix" or have staff reconfigure the poll for. There's never been a formal way of handling this and it isn't something they should stress over in the future if its off by a day. TonyBallioni (talk) 04:11, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
• Just to be clear, the election does operate based on a specific, formal, standardized schedule, and according to our own records Tuesday voting is not a tradition, it's an error. If there was an issue in 2018 and the voting had to be postponed a day, that's not a big deal, but the fact that it was carried over was apparently an oversight that we didn't catch when updating the subsequent year's page, not an actual rule change. Something to note for next year. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 05:25, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
  • Good catch. The one place I didn’t look for the discussion. Thanks for finding it :) TonyBallioni (talk) 05:32, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
    • Well in fairness, the talk page of the pre-election RfC is not somewhere you'd think to go for any reason, much less the only place you'd expect to find the compendium of election rules. It was only a couple years ago that someone actually compiled all of the RfC decisions, I think it was SQL. As you can see we're still working on getting away from the "traditional" blind faith in copy-pasting last year's pages and anecdotal blustering about what the rules are. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 05:49, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
      • I think it was KTC who compiled the previous election decisions. There was a proposal in the 2019 RC of setting the timeline such that the election so that it did not start on a weekend San Francisco time, but it didn't reach consensus (largely, it seems now, because some people completely missed the point). It's one of the reasons I proposed the rule this year about formally allowing the commissioners to adjust the election period in the event of technical or similar issues. I would prefer the Tuesday start to be maintained. Thryduulf (talk) 14:03, 21 November 2020 (UTC)
        • I think the commission made a good call for this year, and yes lets formalize it in the RfC next year. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:46, 21 November 2020 (UTC)

Pre-empting this comment - working on it :) Joe Sutherland (WMF) (talk) 00:03, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks was just about to ping you [ab6b30a1-c493-46c3-b528-38561b8f07cb] 2020-11-24 00:03:12: Fatal exception of type "RuntimeException" when voting. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:04, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Remember folks, if you're still in line when the polls are supposed to close they have to let you vote! AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 00:33, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Test worked, JSutherland (WMF) please let us know if the dust has settled before we advertise anything. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:36, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Xaosflux should be good to go now DannyS712 (talk) 00:37, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Good to go. Sorry for the hiccup. The gory details are in the Phab ticket if anyone is interested. Joe Sutherland (WMF) (talk) 00:39, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Cyberpower678 and Xaosflux: I know it was briefly mentioned at this thread earlier, but do you guys know where we are on getting the mass message set up this year? It looks like Cyberpower678 mentioned he was ready to generate the recipient list with his script, but it doesn't look like it's been run yet. Thanks, Mz7 (talk) 21:15, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Mz7, It's running now. Final SecurePoll list and MM lists are being generated right now and will be ready in one hour. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:06, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

@Cyberpower678: Please ping me when you have it ready so I can import to SecurePoll. Thanks! Joe Sutherland (WMF) (talk) 22:48, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

JSutherland (WMF), It's 70% there. ETA 20 minutes. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 23:08, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

JSutherland (WMF), it's up. Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Coordination/SecurePoll —CYBERPOWER (Around) 23:44, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

@Cyberpower678: Excellent! Added to votewiki now. As always, we can add folks who are eligible but not in the list for some reason as overrides later. Joe Sutherland (WMF) (talk) 23:48, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

@Cyberpower678: thanks for the updates, please drop a note when the MMS lists are ready as well. We've had some recurring problems with the messages in prior years so lets be sure to do the actual sending with extra care this year too. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:00, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Xaosflux, they're ready now. I'm about to send them out. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 00:01, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Xaosflux, Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Coordination/MassMessage —CYBERPOWER (Around) 00:01, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Xaosflux, Can I send them out? —CYBERPOWER (Around) 00:05, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Cyberpower678: Should not while the voting server is broken! — xaosflux ^Talk 00:06, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Cyberpower678: while waiting, perhaps do some tests to Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2020/Coordination/MMS/10 . — xaosflux ^Talk 00:08, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Xaosflux, Alright. I need to get food, so I will leave it to you to send out the messages. The header should be "ArbCom 2020 Elections voter message" and the body should be "((subst:ACEMM))". You know where the batch pages are. :-) —CYBERPOWER (Around) 00:08, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

No rush, just don't want to spoil the chance to get people's attention - then the link fails and they forget about it. As long as this goes out in the next day it should be fine. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:10, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Nothing needs to be done to Template:ACEMM. It's all automated. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 00:10, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Initial test sent, checking now. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:13, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

 In progress getting ready to queue these. — xaosflux ^Talk 01:01, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

First 5000 sent, additional checking in progress. — xaosflux ^Talk 01:15, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Ok so they haven't really been sent yet, just looked like it - but the counter has been broken for years (c.f. phab:T209899), need to fall back to checking the destination pages. — xaosflux ^Talk 01:20, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Batch processing under way. — xaosflux ^Talk 01:29, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

• This should be done now, if any issues are found please let us know. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:13, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

  @Xaosflux: Can blocked editors cast a vote? I've seen a few sockpuppets getting message deliveries. --qedk (t 愛 c) 08:26, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

  @QEDK: they have to be not blocked from the English Wikipedia at the time of their vote - we shouldn't have messaged users that were blocked when the list was generated if the block was longer than the election. So they shouldn't be able to actually vote, if you can leave a few example usernames we can see if the message generation list needs fixes for next year. — xaosflux ^Talk 11:55, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

  @Xaosflux: This was the account in question. Given what you said, the block does indeed expire before the election ends so it's not technically wrong, although it does not sit well with me that sockmasters are getting election notifications (I know... WP:NOTPUNITIVE, this that). --qedk (t 愛 c) 15:54, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

  @QEDK: thanks for the response, it appears that user will be eligible to vote once their block expires so this seems like an appropriate inclusion. Should their block be extended they will no longer be eligible. If you'd like to propose that we change the messaging inclusion criteria or voter suffrage requirements for the next election you can make a proposal at Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2021 (you can watchlist it now so you know when it goes live). — xaosflux ^Talk 15:59, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi @Mz7: and ElectCom,

Would it be possible to ask a third question on Bradv's TP (I used up two when I thought it was a 3q limit) - I couldn't reasonably define it as a follow-up question.

Cheers, Nosebagbear (talk) 11:14, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Nosebagbear: I don't think the ElectCom has a purview to deal with questions posed outside of ACE pages, after all, it's simply an optional question you're personally asking them. --qedk (t 愛 c) 15:56, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Nosebagbear, qedk's interpretation is the same as my own—if you want to ask Bradv a question on his user talk page, that's fine, as the question limit only applies to what can appear on the official election Q&A page. With that being said, as I mentioned here, since you posted your first two questions before we updated that typo on the question page that said the limit was 3, we would be willing to give you an exemption to let you ask a third question directly on the official election Q&A page, if you prefer that. Mz7 (talk) 17:40, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

I'll grab the latter, cheers all :) Nosebagbear (talk) 19:24, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm a little confused when reading the section on vacant seats. It says there are 7 seats open, and from the figure, all seem to be in tranche alpha. Yet, the text suggests that some people will be elected for only one year. Why is that? Am I overlooking something glaringly obvious? effeietsanders 06:52, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

It spells it out in the very section you link to—two years for candidates with 60%+ support, one year for candidates with 50%-60% support, no term for candidates getting less than 50% even if they're in the top seven. ‑ Iridescent 06:55, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

Sure. But what is the logic behind this? Shouldn't Alpha and Beta be roughly the same size? effeietsanders 19:55, 24 November 2020 (UTC)

@Effeietsanders: because AC members must demonstrate support of the community via the election, those with marginal support only get partial terms to carry over committee staffing until the next election. It is possible for the community to reduce the size of the sitting committee by approving less seats than are open as well. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:02, 24 November 2020 (UTC)