[Wikipedia-l] Re: "adminship is no big deal"

Wed Jan 18 15:11:25 UTC 2006

Walter Vermeir wrote:
> Habj <sweetadelaide at ...> writes:
> 
> 
>>This statemant, "adminship is no big deal", originates from enwiki.
>>Could someone please explain in what circumstances this saying was
>>worded? I see it used meaning "adminship is no big deal, so you
>>shouldn't be so careful who to elect for this task" as well as
>>"adminship is no big deal, so you shouldn't try and find ways to get
>>rid of admins who are obviously unsuitable for the job".
>>
>>My guess is: this sentence originates from the truly virgin stage of
>>wikipedia, where some people wanted to avoid others starting fighting
>>for admin (or at the time, "sysop") status. Currently, I see no reason
>>for the remaining of this statements in various places in the
>>Wikipedia namespace in various wikipedias - none at all.
>>
>>/Habj
> 
> 
> I have not found the source from that quote. But I have found some postings 
> from the early days that are about this is and contain that attitude I think.
> 
> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.misc/2197/
> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.misc/3804/
> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.misc/2172/ 
> 
> Walter

It should be reminded that originally (before the phases II/III of the 
software, which were implemented in spring then summer 2002 on the 
english wikipedia the "sysop" power were quite different from what they 
are right now.
Afaik, phase II was never implemented on non english projects (german 
maybe ?) and international projects jumped directly from phase I to 
phase III end of 2002 and beginning 2003.

The original sysop (phase I) had a technical interface to delete or 
block editors. There was no protection feature. Deletion was "final" 
(content could not be recovered, ever). On the english wp, I think only 
Jimbo and Larry ever had that status. On a few languages, others had it 
(on the french, Aoineko, Shaihulud and myself, for 3 months, before we 
upgraded to phase II).

The current sysop status was introduced in phase II (probably) and 
really used in phase III. I presume Jimbo made the sysops in phase II 
and it switched to a voting model somewhere in phase III. I remember 
that in spring 2003, candidates were basically saying on the mailing 
list "could I be sysop ?" and if there was no opposition, it was done so 
(by a developer).

If you look at Walter archives, the first and third links are post to 
phase I, just bordering phase II. This was when the sysop status with 
reversibility action was introduced. Before that date, there was really 
no sysop.

Link II was posted around the time phase III was introduced. As you can 
note, it refers to non-reversible actions possible for sysops. However, 
afaik, except for images, sysops have never been able to do irreversable 
actions.

ant