Anthere wrote:

May international wikipedias have a different power structure than the english one ?

I think that each project should have its own structure, not just the international wikipedias.

Will all the stewards currently listed on meta have these powers over all wikipedias or just the english one ?

I looked through that and I found it unclear. I'm not quite sure what the correct term is anymore. "Steward" seems acceptable, as is the present "bureaucrat". "Honorary developer" strikes me as misleading.

I agree with Tim that developers should not be meddling in the politics of the individual projects. Doing so can damage their credibility. I agree with the duties that Tim would allocate to developers, though I would add to that the duty to deal with bug issues and other technical matters. Since their are not enough developers to allow each project to have its own private developer, each project should have at least one of the developers be its "assigned" developer. That developer would have the task of occasionally reviewing bug reports on the project, and attempting to deal with them. If he finds himself being asked "political" questions his only option would be to refer those question to the appropriate person - most likely the bureaucrat for the project.

In a new project the developer is also both a sysop and a bureaucrat. It is in his own best interest to delegate these powers as soon as possible. (Note: I prefer to avoid semantic distinctions between "rights" and "powers")

Each project should have at least one bureaucrat, and that bureaucrat rights should be assigned on a per project basis. This does not prevent a project from having more than one bureaucrat. Being a bureaucrat on the tamil wikipedia would be pointless is I don't understand Tamil.

The key asset that a bureaucrat brings to a project is the ability to view the project at the big picture level. Like the chief justice of a court or the speaker of a legislature, his vote counts for no more than that of his coleagues. He is just there to insure that things get done, and if one of those tasks is creating further sysops, it can become clear to the members that he will carry out the will of the members when so asked. A modicum of mediation skills and common sense can be helpful to a person in this position.

Ec