[Foundation-l] retire the administrator privilege

[Ray Saintonge]

On 03/04/11 2:04 AM, Amir E. Aharoni wrote:
> 2011/3/4 Ray Saintonge<saintonge at telus.net>:
>> On 03/03/11 5:44 AM, Amir E. Aharoni wrote:
>>> The name "administrator" gives the impression of some mythical
>>> "balance of power", although administrators don't actually
>>> administrate - they (un)delete, (un)block and (un)protect, in addition
>>> to editing articles and participating in discussions just like
>>> everybody else. The name "sysop" (system operator), used occasionally
>>> in English, and more frequently in some other languages (e.g. Hebrew),
>>> sounds less like a managerial role, but it's technical and cryptic and
>>> requires explanation.
>>>
>>> Giving user groups exact and real names will likely change the
>>> attitude of many users who see these user groups as "the powers that
>>> be" and think that they're impenetrable.
>> You make a strong point. People cherish their titles and the
>> self-esteem.  Being able to say "I am a Wikipedia administrator," to
>> someone who has never edited Wikipedia gives an impression of
>> importance. Breaking the task into its components leaves each part less
>> prestigious.
> Most admins with whom i am familiar aren't using their adminship to
> gain prestige.
>
> I'd rather be "the guy who wrote a detailed encyclopedic article about
> every diacritic sign in the Hebrew alphabet" than an admin - i find a
> lot more prestige in it. I am happy about being an admin, not because
> of prestige, but because having the permission to delete pages without
> going through some request page is simply useful for writing articles
> and making the wiki better.
>
> Put simply, good admins, who use their permissions to create a better
> wiki, are not supposed to object to such a change.

Absolutely, but you only get that warped perspective because you deal 
essentially with good admins. :-P

It's the ones that you don't associate with that I would worry about.

Ray