Wikipedia talk:List of administrators/Inactive

Inactive admins

So yeah, there's almost 200 admins who just decided to quit. Why don't they lose their tools? Enigma ^message 14:08, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Inactive administrators (2005). -- Rick Block (talk) 00:04, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, I don't know how to respond to that. It's a perfectly reasonable proposal. Not sure why there's no consensus. Admins should be held to a higher standard and expected to remain active. Enigma ^message 00:24, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Please read the talk page (and the archives it refers to). The basic argument boils down to "community trust should be permanent" with a little bit of "what problem does this fix" thrown in for good measure. At the point I proposed it the software did not enforce strong passwords and didn't limit unsuccessful login attempts, so this list was sort of an open invitation to hackers. At least that concern has now been addressed (on multiple fronts). Given the opposition to this proposal even then, I suspect re-raising it now would be rather pointless. Is there a problem? -- Rick Block (talk) 04:07, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Not necessarily. I just don't like it. And yes, that was one of the things that I was thinking about. Passwords. If someone isn't using an account, you don't want admin accounts just floating around for someone to hack. Enigma ^message 04:11, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Passwords are now checked for strength (implemented in kind of a hurry after a series of admin accounts were compromised), and multiple login attempts run into a captcha, so I don't think there's any particular argument that these accounts are vulnerable in any significant way (neither of these used to be true). I think the argument for doing this now boils down to a general tidiness sort of argument, for which there's likely to be considerable resistance. Perhaps there might be a consensus that the sysop bit should be removed from accounts owned by users who've died, but I'm not even sure this would have consensus support (I don't think we've had any admins who've died, but given how long some of these accounts have been inactive I'm not entirely sure we'd know). -- Rick Block (talk) 04:36, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, looks like accounts being compromised isn't much of a concern anymore. Part of my original argument was that while every account is at risk somewhat, the more admin accounts, the more risk you're running. I just felt it wasn't worth the risk if the user wasn't contributing. But even if you take that part out, I still feel that it's not right for someone to pursue and obtain admin tools, and then disappear. Part of being sysopped is a commitment to the community. A regular user has no commitment to the community; they can come and go as they please. While what I'm saying might run a little contrary to WP:NOBIGDEAL, I think that being an admin is a responsibility. Anyway, this is a minor thing, but it also serves to unnecessarily inflate the admin numbers. Saying we can a thousand and change admins is very misleading, because a number of them just decided to grab the tools and run. Enigma ^message 05:41, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Useight

Note that User:Useight has a (slightly) active alt account, User:Useight's Public Sock. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 22:15, 21 November 2015 (UTC).

• Since Useight performs administrative and bureaucratic actions from the alternate account (Useight's Public Sock (talk · contribs)), their main account remains protected from procedural removal for activity requirements. –xeno^talk 16:53, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

  "Useight performs administrative and bureaucratic actions from the alternate account (Useight's Public Sock)" - this is impossible technically, since the sock account has no advanced permissions set. --XXN, 14:13, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

User:JGHowes

JGHowes passed away last month. --evrik ^(talk) 15:26, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

What about last 100 edits

Maybe last 100 edits should be included because of the new Criterion 2 for removal of inactive administrators. Thingofme (talk) 03:24, 2 January 2023 (UTC)