First of all, congratulations to the newly elected! Time is coming for me to passthe baton, and I can't wait to see so many great additions to the admin corps!
As Isaid in October andNovember, I think we should allow a few cycles to run before discussing changes. This will allow for more experience to be gained with a specific set of rules and thus help avoid overreacting to the most recent election, as well as provide stability for the vast majority of editors who aren't following every discussion on admin elections. We run the risk of perpetually keeping potential candidates off-balance by constantly changing the conditions for the election.isaacl (talk)19:48, 16 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Personally, I'm reluctant to lock in a specific interval at this point. My personal preference is to establish a regular cadence for the elections themselves, making them an ordinary, regular occurrence, and less of a special event, much like most other Wikipedia processes. With there being only two or three elections per year, I think having a regular schedule for adjusting the conditions works against establishing elections as a normal, ongoing process.isaacl (talk)20:06, 16 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Isaacl. Many proposals have received opposition based on a lack of evidence, the best way to get that evidence is to run a few cycles with the same rules so that we can get that data with minimal confounding variables (including time of year, proximity to arbcom elections, etc). I don't think we should have a specific cadence for RFCs either, or if we do it should be expressed in terms of a number of elections (minimum three imo).Thryduulf (talk)19:56, 16 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion is closed.Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Since the discussion above is leaning against an RFC phase, should we skip the debrief phase too? The main goal of the debrief phase is to collect ideas for rfc's. –Novem Linguae(talk)00:59, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Supporting this. It can also be useful (for candidates, nominators, election officials and voters) to discuss anything they might find worthy of note regarding how the election went.ChaoticEnby (talk ·contribs)01:23, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To be honest though, I think we did something wrong for Bunnyprav to not have made it. They were 3% away from 70% (also I didn't even know 65%+ was a failure), and I saw no complaint about them other thanAfD, which is not supposed to be even close to disqualifying someone.Wikieditor662 (talk)02:07, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure I agree that we did something wrong or the process didn't work. There was a very steep dropoff from the next lowest vote-getter. We unfortunately can't know what voters' reasoning was, but it was clear people had reservations. I think for a candidate like this, RfA in six months is probably the answer.Valereee (talk)10:12, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
One candidate falling just short of the pass threshold does not mean anyone did anything wrong, it just means that they didn't quite get enough support to be elected. I'm not sure what, if any, remedy you're proposing, but if you're saying the threshold should be lowered to 65%, then we'd soon enough be having a similar discussion about a candidate getting only 62% when in someone's opinion they should have got through. --DoubleGrazing (talk)10:24, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm with Valeree and DG, the gap between Bunnyprav and the next lower candidate was over 13 percentage points. There was a complaint in the comments that pointed toWP:NOTYET (although it likely should've beenWP:NOTQUITEYET instead), so voters were likely turned off by the fact that they have less than a year and a half of active time on Wikipedia (despite being an older account, it didn't even reach the autoconfirmed threshold of 10 edits until mid-2024).--Ahecht (TALK PAGE)15:01, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That's interesting, because if I remember correctly, a bureaucrat told me that they think it's okay as long as they're over 12 months old, even though you'd get some opposes for being under 24 months. I didn't know it would have automatically disqualified someone. I was also surprised to see that it wasn't brought up in the discussion.Wikieditor662 (talk)17:02, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It's not a matter of automatically disqualifying. It's more likely a matter of enough editors thinking something like, "Hm...if they'd been actively editing for two full years, I'd be on board, but between this and the concerns about AfD understanding, I'm a no this time around."
Opinions are divided on what constitutes 'enough' experience, and a crat/admin is no more likely than any other editor experienced with RfA/EfA outcomes to be correct about that.Valereee (talk)17:13, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) There is no minimum account age requirement to be an admin, beyond being extended confirmed, so nobody in the election was automatically disqualified (if they didn't meet the requirements they wouldn't have been on the ballot). It might be the case that other editors' personal standards require someone to have two years experience, but given that 280 people supported them this is clearly not true for everybody.Thryduulf (talk)17:14, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A debrief/lessons learned/retrospective phase serves multiple purposes, including gathering people's experiences, feedback, and ideas for improvement. Sometimes these require further community discussion in the form of a request for comments. Sometimes it's just info that we can gather for future use. I support having this phase. Now of course people can provide this feedback any time, even outside of a debrief phase, but it's often helpful to prompt people to do it.isaacl (talk)02:12, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to see a (quick, optional) debrief phase so we can collect the data that people were saying they wanted a few elections worth of while it's still fresh in the heads of everyone involved. In particular, I think UtherSRG is going to have a valuable perspective now that admins who get recalled are going to always have election as an option, and I'm curious how size of the election corresponds to the experiences of the candidates.Tazerdadog (talk)— Precedingundated comment added02:03, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Admins who get recalled are going to always have election as an option; I don't think that is true? The timing worked out so that UtherSRG would be able to run in AELECT, but if an admin was recalled right now they wouldn't have AELECT as an option AFAIK.45dogs (they/them)(talk page)(contributions)02:10, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed.Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Isn't 12+ months of active editing enough? Also, I'm considering either removing the edit count for next time, or just base it off on whether the editors had at least 7,000 edits or so, because some people do way more per edit than others.Wikieditor662 (talk)16:52, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
12 months may be enough for most votersif the editor is otherwise a stellar candidate. Edit count is just a data point. Some people, as you say, make a dozen edits to do the same work someone else might do in one. And some editors' counts are swollen by automated edits. It's just a data point. Very few people are looking at 10K edits and thinking "that's not enough" in a vacuum.Valereee (talk)17:27, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Weird, it also saysThose who succeed during their RfA usually have 12 consecutive months of recent activity, including participation in admin-related maintenance areas., perhaps that part should change.Wikieditor662 (talk)19:45, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Advice for RfA candidates page just does its best to document what the community consensus leans towards. Predicting how the user base will support or oppose a candidate is hard, because it's a consensus discussion (in RfAs) or a collective consensus of voting (in AELECT) based on a lot of different people's standards for adminship. Some editors think twelve months of activity is just fine, others at least two years, others something else. All are within policy, but it's thus hard to quantify exactly what the community thinks, though many current editors can field a decent guess. (My best guess is that the median falls somewhere between eighteen months and two years' activity, but I could be off.)Perfect4th (talk)19:54, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agree with P4th, the advice is just the advice, mostly from experienced editors, not some sort of "Do X, Y, Z and you'll be elected admin/succeed at RfA". We'll never try to make any definite declarations at either Advice for RfA candidates or Advice for admin elections candidates. Other than "Get a nominator" lol.Valereee (talk)20:29, 17 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for asking for feedback. I probably don't have to say (but I will anyway!) that I'm not a fan of voter guides for AELECT, but anyway... In my opinion, using the format of a table with various metrics isn't an ideal way to guide voters. I prefer an approach that addresses each candidate as an individual, and make a recommendation based upon whatever factors are best applicable to that particular candidate. --Tryptofish (talk)00:10, 18 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If it doesn't look too off base, any reason not to just move it to WP space? That way it'll show up in blue so people are more likely to edit?Valereee (talk)14:02, 19 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Novem Linguae, I've createdWikipedia:Administrator elections/May 2026/Todo list. I removed some things that seemed to be notes to yourself, figuring this should be evolving into a list anyone can help clear. I'm thinking some things may need to be clarified for the same reason -- you know exactly what you mean, but someone else may not. I hope this is helpful rather than the opposite, I've seen how hard you've been working to make this process work smoothly, and I'm hoping others will pitch in where they can so you don't end up burnt out on it before others know how to run the process.
Looks great! I noticed that the todo list has asking for monitors and scrutineers – isn't that usually done at the same time as asking for clerks? Although I'm definitely volunteering for clerk this time, so if you and Novem are the other two we already got our team.ChaoticEnby (talk ·contribs)12:47, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Is AELECT clerking basically what I'm doing -- just the day-to-day keeping the process moving? I'm happy to do that, but I probably shouldn't volunteer to be one of three official clerks. I have things going on IRL that may mean I disappear, possibly with little notice, for unknown lengths of time at unknown points in the next two years.Valereee (talk)12:53, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, clerks are in charge of keeping the to-do list moving, so I figured you were already starting in advance! Although we're always glad to have people help with it even if they aren't in the "official" clerk list, and that might be more convenient for you if you have some real-life obligations.ChaoticEnby (talk ·contribs)13:04, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I'll just keep plugging along as I have bandwidth and there are upcoming tasks that don't look like I could screw up too badly. :DValereee (talk)13:18, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
What do you think about adding something like 'Help with the May 2026 election ToDo List!' at Wikipedia:Administrator elections/May 2026/Header? Probably not needed. Seems like just using this talk page has recruited you and Chaotic Enby to work on this stuff, and perhaps others will jump in :)
Is AELECT clerking basically what I'm doing -- just the day-to-day keeping the process moving? It's half the project management stuff that you're doing, and half SecurePoll stuff.
Speaking of, I've been wondering if most of it could be made into a subst: template where you could fill the date of the election and the template would generate the page automatically. Only issue with that plan is that updates made to the to-do list after substing will have to be synced with the base template, but maybe that could be an interesting idea to explore?ChaoticEnby (talk ·contribs)13:30, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
+1 to anything that makes these manual chores automatic, while noting that I have zero idea how that works so can't be of assistance.Valereee (talk)13:33, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
And in fact I have no idea what's going onhere, but it's producing a time/date that is correct in my time zone (rather than producing a UTC date and noting that it is a UTC date), which surprised me. I have no idea howTemplate:Administrator elections status works. Wouldn't even know what to add to the ToDo list to make sure it got done.Valereee (talk)15:25, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have any gadgets or scripts installed related to time/datestamps? I see "Nominations for the May 2026 administrator elections will open 00:00, 29 April 2026 (UTC)."isaacl (talk)17:21, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I created{{Administrator election schedule}} at someone's request, but it hasn't been adopted. If there is no interest in using it, then it can be deleted. Personally I think a helper template to display ranges is useful so "23:59" doesn't have to be manually prefixed to a date retrieved from{{Administrator elections status/data}}, and only those who update{{Administrator elections status/data}} have to remember if the end dates in the template are at 00:00 or 23:59. (In spite of the documentation currently saying the end dates entered in the template are at 00:00, starting with the December 2025 election, they are at 23:59.) But I appreciate that seeing the scaffolding may be more instructive for editors newly involved with admin elections, which may be more sustainable over the long run.isaacl (talk)17:38, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Folded the status in the data template, so we should be able to use it without any parameter on pretty much every subpage, and without having to create and maintain a new header for each election.ChaoticEnby (talk ·contribs)03:24, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I like the 23:59 style and chose to do it this way on purpose. The reasoning is...
Deadline:
23:59 Dec 1
0:00 Dec 2
In bullet #2, it is possible for someone to accidentally think they have all day on Dec 2, if they don't carefully read and pay attention to the 0:00. This class of error is impossible with bullet #1. –Novem Linguae(talk)01:35, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
At present, the various admin election pages for the December 2025 election (and thus I assume for the next election) assume that the end dates shown in{{Administrator elections status/data}} are at 23:59.{{Administrator elections status}}was changed to align with this for the end of nominations and voting (I don't think the message at the end of the status template will ever get displayed, though). Although in theory it would be nice if it aligned with the corresponding template for the arbitrator elections, which use end dates at 00:00, in practice it doesn't really matter, as long as everyone knows the standard to follow when setting the dates in the template.isaacl (talk)02:33, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I think if we decide it's important to align admin with arb election formats, I'd rather see those change to 23:59 to align with admin elections rather than the other way around. The risk of confusion -- an admin candidate thinking they had 24 hours longer than they actually do -- along with the potentially high cost of that (not adding your nom in time) is pretty compelling to me. The other end times probably don't carry the same potential for damage to a candidate, but we actually had someoneask if one of the candidates had added themselves in time and should be DQd, so I don't think we can assume we'd be able to just say, "Oh, you were confused? No worries, we can see you intended to get this done in time."Valereee (talk)17:20, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
To clarify, the arbitration election pages all specify the end of any phase with "23:59date" time/date stamps in text, precisely to avoid any confusion with candidates, voters, or anyone else interested in any phase of the arbitration election. Internally, the{{Arbitration Committee candidate/data}} template, upon which{{Administrator elections status/data}} was based, specifies the end dates of phases at 00:00. Everywhere{{Arbitration Committee candidate/data}} is used to display an end date in text, a day is subtracted off the end date and the time/datestamp for 23:59 on that day is generated. Personally, I don't see much point in churning{{Arbitration Committee candidate/data}} and all the pages that use it.isaacl (talk)23:03, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
There are a couple of options in the system that I would like to test out before the May 2026 election, more for quality of life changes rather than anything else:
making use of SecurePoll's eligibility list generator. This wasn't present in AELECT2, and I didn't have the time to figure if this would work well for AELECT3. If we can use the generator, we do not need to manually generate the eligibility list anymore.
generating of keys:
check if we can use PuttyGen to do the key generation, and what would be the instructions to do so. This is for non technical admins who do not wish to install openssl on their machines and/or run command line/terminal.
check if increasing key length of the keys will affect the election adversely. this is more for pre-emptive security improvement. The keys are generated on 2048-bit key length by default. Various industry standards assume such keys will no longer be secure by 2030. The world is moving toward 4096-bit key length or other algos to enhance the security.
As far as I'm aware I don't think there's a reason. When I split out the October 2024 trial election details into it's own page I didn't add the results (but that was an oversight on my part), and I think the pages for subsequent elections have been using roughly the same format. I'd support the results being transcluded onto the main election pages, seems like a no brainer.BugGhost🦗👻18:52, 19 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Regardingthis edit: I disagree with the statement that the shortcut EfA should become commonly used. Personally I feel AELECT is a suitable, intuitive abbreviation for those who wish to use something other than "admin elections" (which is my preference). I don't think EfA is intuitive by itself, and the phrase it represents, election for adminship, isn't a typical format for English phrases describing elections. I appreciate some people like to use relatively short abbreviations in upper case or mixed case as jargon, but jargon loses its effectiveness when there are multiple synonyms for the same concept.isaacl (talk)01:35, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I agree completely with 45dogs. Even after several months of seeing EFA I still don't connect it with admin elections in my head until I see surrounding context and realise they mean AELECT - my initial reaction is usually that it's something to do with footnotes (although I can't explainwhy I think that).Thryduulf (talk)03:26, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with all of the above -WP:EFA has never been intuitive to me, and I don't think we should endorse it at the top of the page. As (at time of writing) there are four editors in agreement, I've undone the edit for now.BugGhost🦗👻08:53, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I was the one who made the edit, and would like to note here that I am fine with the edit being reverted based on consensus. @Isaacl, a ping would have been appreciated, since my edit is basically the subject of this talk page section :)~/Bunnypranav:<ping>09:58, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I prefer not singling out one person when discussing a change in general, to try to avoid personalizing the discussion, though it will depend on the nature of the change. I understand, though, that others may prefer a different practice.isaacl (talk)17:16, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
My rule of thumb for page shortcuts is "provide up to 3". Even though I prefer the AELECT shortcut, I'd be OK with putting the other two back. –Novem Linguae(talk)19:47, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Different people writing different shortcuts in different places can only increase the burden on the audience reading their comments. The use of shortcuts in posts assumes that the readers will recognise them.
Editors mayuse their own shortcuts, as in entering them into the Go box, without any burden in any audience. There is no issue with the existence of shortcuts. The issue is with theWP:LINKBOX stating that there are recommended shortcuts to use when describing a page or section.
Here, we are talking aboutWP:AELECT,WP:ADE, &WP:EFA. All are over twelve months old. Their 90-day pageviews are 964, 182, & 254. If 964 is like the height of a human, the other two are like below and above the knees. One towers above the other two. Comprehension of talk page posts is much easier if people are using the same jargon, and for this page, most people are already in usingWP:AELECT, and so that should be the sole recommended shortcut for use when talking about this page. The other shortcuts will continue to work.SmokeyJoe (talk)11:51, 10 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Hovering over the shortcut link just reveals the URL of the shortcut link, which doesn't provide any additional information. Also note that relying on hovering to convey information is an accessibility issue. Not all devices support hovering, and some users have difficulty with fine-motor control, making hovering difficult.isaacl (talk)18:47, 18 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Hovering over AELECT, EFA, ADE shows Administrator Elections? Maybe I have a different gadget? Obviously no objection to making things more accessible, but I also don't think we need to reduce things we can hover over because some folks can't easily hover. Let's find a solution for that rather than removing something that works for people who can hover.Valereee (talk)00:25, 19 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
If you haveWP:POPUPS (or another gadget I forget the name of) installed then you get a preview of the target of the link when you hover. However this behaviour is identical for all shortcuts so isn't a reason to favour (or disfavour) one over an other.Thryduulf (talk)01:31, 19 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I don't have any gadgets installed that affect hovering behaviour, so for me I just see "Wikipedia:EFA" in a tool tip, and the URL down at the bottom of the browser page. I didn't say anything about taking away hovering behaviour. However we shouldn't only convey essential information through hovering. (As I mentioned earlier, I think the best solution is just to write "admin elections", but I understand that not everyone wants to do that.)isaacl (talk)04:37, 19 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Where the heck does one edit this? It says "The discussion phase will have monitors who are administrators who will moderate any comments that are too rude", which I think needs to be edited to something like "The discussion phase will have monitors who are administrators who will moderate inappropriate comments/questions", as 'that are too rude' just seems like both too much and not enough. I see this must be pulling from some other page, but I can't figure it out. An example of what NL was talking about above that automating can make it difficult for others to edit.Valereee (talk)15:57, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Well that's ironic. The complex code intended to keep us from having to make the change twice is still resulting in us having to make the change twice. lol
How strong is the reason the Procedures section here needs to pull from a template? That is, how many places would need to be updated every time this current Procedures section is updated?Valereee (talk)18:47, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
This response was originally for one of your earlier comments, but since you replied more, I needed to add more info which is why I'm replying to this one.
fanfanboy, thanks! So once someone connects Administrator elections status/data/latest month to (for example) Wikipedia:Administrator elections/May 2026 which has been created, the May 2026 becomes the go-to? So basically, the ToDo list entry would be: After Wikipedia:Administrator elections/UPCOMING has been created, update Administrator elections status/data/latest month?Valereee (talk)19:48, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Though, I'd recommend giving it about 3-4 weeks before setting up the next elections pages instead immediately after the previous one ends. We have 5 months and there's no rush after all.fanfanboy(blocktalk)22:23, 22 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I think that would go into the ToDo of the planning period for the upcoming election, not the wrap up period of the previous election.Valereee (talk)11:59, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Date of the next election should not be displayed in header
"Nominations for the May 2026 administrator elections will open 5:00 pm, 28 April 2026, Tuesday (3 months, 5 days from now) (UTC−7)." is incorrect and should be fixed. The date of the next election has not been chosen yet. –Novem Linguae(talk)07:38, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, then here we go. 365 divided by 12 is 30.4. 30.4 times 5 is 152. 152 days after November 25th is April 26th. Therefore, we start the Call for candidates on Sunday, April 26th at 00:01. ;P --Super Goku V (talk)08:33, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
The reason I defaulted to the placeholder dates I used was to replicate the in-week timing of the previous election timing. That is, to allow discussion and questions to happen over the weekend, to maximize the likelihood most candidates will have free time. That affects all the other timings. Because months have different lengths, that means weshouldn't default to starting 152 days after the previous election started.Valereee (talk)11:32, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Ahecht, well, I'm going to say not? The discussion phase is 5 days, so there'salways a whole/partial Friday and a whole Monday and a whole/partial Tuesday, plus either a partial Wednesday or a partial Thursday (am I counting correctly lol?), depending on where they are. There's alwaysmore nonweekend than weekend if you're including the weekend in a period of five days. Open to your reasoning, though?Valereee (talk)17:09, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Pretty sure the only problem with doing that is that it will use the December 2025 procedures section instead of the May 2026 one. This isn't really much of an issue though so I think it's fine, it will be fixed when we choose the May dates anyway.fanfanboy(blocktalk)13:16, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Can't we just be bold in choosing a date, then see if there's a need for discussion rather than assuming a discussion is needed? The five months timing that has already been decided would mean opening the call for candidates the last week of April. Prioritizing having discussion over the weekend means call would ideally start on a Wednesday, maybe a Tuesday, I think? Are you saying you object to the placeholder timing? Or that the default setting is that each election date needs discussion? If the latter, maybe instead we should discuss what the default setting for dates is rather than discussing fresh every five months?Valereee (talk)11:45, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Honestly, if we need to discuss it every single time, then we should probably do something like a batch of dates for ten elections at once or elect someone to pick reasonable dates. --Super Goku V (talk)11:49, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Or we could ask, "Shall election timing be set to allow the discussion phase to start on a Friday to allow most of the early discussion to happen over a weekend?" That way we wouldn't need to have another discussion if we ever change the length of various phases?Valereee (talk)11:53, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
In the past there have been significant kerfuffles (aka RfCs) over the exact date of each AELECT. I personally think doing it throughBRD as you have would be great, if you can get away with it...Toadspike[Talk]19:25, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I do sometimes feel assuming discussion is necessary causes more problems than it solves. Which I guess is the whole point of BOLD.Valereee (talk)21:20, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I meant start the call for candidates on a UTC Tuesday. Time zones are hard, lol. Will edit the todo list again. Here's the schedule from AELECT3, which I assume we will copy for AELECT4:
So then we'd be prioritizing starting discussion phase on a Thursday? Works for me, but right now it's a Tuesday. I was thinking we didn't want to specify the start of the entire process, or the starts of any other phases, as we may find we need to change the lengths of other phases, but discussion should start either on a Thursday or a Friday, so that's the phase we should specify the beginning of?Valereee (talk)21:41, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Well, but anyone should be able to propose dates, shouldn't they? If we've got consensus on the basics, that means anyone can do it.Valereee (talk)21:52, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Tentatively proposing that the discussion phase should anchor on the 2nd Thursday of the month 12:01am UTC, once every 5 months? Unless for some reason there is consensus for another date.Leijurv (talk)21:59, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Well, editors do come and go, for any number of reasons. We need this to be something anyone can do, not tied to a single editor's availability.Valereee (talk)22:11, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly this. Also these are community elections currently administratively coordinated by one person (currently Novem Linguae), not elections run at the whim of any one person - regardless of who that person is or why they make the decisions they do, the timing shoulnd't be, or appear to be, controlled by a single person. I'm explicitly not accusing Novem (or anyone else) of any impropriety, but having the timing at one person's sole discretion allows more opportunity for that should they choose to go rogue.Thryduulf (talk)22:30, 23 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
There are 4 months or so left to the May election. I think bus factor is not an issue, there are currently7 admins with the election clerk rights, with three of us having experience of varying levels in setting up an election locally (the rest require the rights for scrutineering). If we want to lock down to a day of the month for regularity, it would be better to check in again say 2-3 weeks before the start of the election cycle which clerks will be involved and in what capacity. Whoever admins aspire to be involved the elections can self-assign the right at the moment, but preferably that you do test runs before the actual elections to familarise yourself with the system/interface.
I personally would prefer to have a fixed day of month to kickstart things so that we are not beholden to any holidays of any particular countries. There is plenty of time for anyone who is interested to submit their nominations (I am sure that there would be people with their RfA on standby between now and the call for candidacy), attend to any questions raised during the election process, and vote to do so.
That being said, scruts needs to be a checkuser, so that may be a limiting factor if we cannot find some from the smaller pool of CUs to work through holidays.– robertsky (talk)06:13, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Robertsky, sorry if I'm misunderstanding, but are you saying you think we don't need set the election dates until 2-3 weeks before the election?
(The reason I ask is that there are a ton oftasks someone like me -- not an election clerk or checkuser, but someone who actually has some spare time right now because we're in for 15 inches of snow this weekend -- can do, but most of them include the dates. If we set those now, we can check those tasks off the list so that election clerks and checkusers and you, if you end up running the election, can focus on what only you can do rather than on all the grunt work.)Valereee (talk)11:30, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I am saying that we can go ahead with the dates, check in again on the personnel side 2-3 weeks before the start in case there are unforeseen issues that cropped up between now and later, like admins dropping off for one reason or another, and find other admins to step into the roles where needed.– robertsky (talk)13:22, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your work on the first 3 elections. I'm sure Robert will do a good job. There would also need to be one more election clerk for AELECT4 as a backup and apprentice. -MPGuy2824 (talk)05:38, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Novem for the work that you've done on the AELECTs. Tbh, I probably wouldn't be a admin if AELECT weren't a thing! --Sohom (talk)11:49, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Completely understandable, you've done more than your fair share of work on this area, including actually getting the process off the ground in the first place. Thanks for everything you've done here.BugGhost🦗👻11:54, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
God damn, great job man. Take your time, AELECT was a thing because you didn't relent; there's been an increase in number of admins since it came into existence.I call you English Wikipedia'sJimbo Wales for making it happen.Vanderwaalforces (talk)11:58, 24 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Ychange candidate pages to have green/successful and red/unsuccessful{{atop}}s