Someone might find these useful. I'm still learning the Google Charts API, and I'd like to see these in other formats eventually.
New Administrators and Resignation GraphsSome notes:
1.
Resignations spiked at 8 in September 2006, 16 in December 2008 and 12 in January 2009.
2. The number of
new administrators peaked in October and December 2005 at 72. The number of new administrators through 2008 declined steadily, from a high of 36 to a low of 6. For 2009, the trend points downward or steady.
3. The number of
resignations over
new administrators first occurred in December 2008, and occurred again in January and March 2009. This excludes data prior to 2007.
The last graph has a detailed view of the last six months.
So...
1. The RFA process has become more difficult, which can explain some of the new administrator drops from 2005 onward. However, this does not explain the entire situation, as the number of new administrator applications has also dropped (graph coming tomorrow).
2. The number of resignations has increased dramatically over the past 15 months, and the trend points upward. Burnout, fatigue, and discontent seem to be the predominant rationales.
For a long time, we counted on a healthy count of administrators to serve Wikipedia. I haven't even begun to go through the inactive list. At a brief glance, many who became administrators from 2004 to 2006 are either inactive or have diminished quantities of edits. This either indicates burnout, fatigue, time constraints, and so on. If the trend continues, then the replenishment rate will continue to be negative, but I do not suspect that it will affect Wikipedia's performance for at least another year.
This post has been edited by seicer: 
Caulde: Yet another admin retirement
