...

...my take on that is that sysops ought to able to grant and revoke sysop status, and developers should be able to grant and revoke developer status, and Jimbo resolves any disputes that may occur.

I think that sounds right. As a social custom, it should be that sysop status should be granted to pretty much anyone who we know, even if we don't like them, unless they are a total jerk. And developer status should be restricted to just people who really are developing.

Allow me to suggest entrance exams: a sysop should someone with a working email address who reads the wikipedia-l list. A developer is someone who has submitted a patch that was checked in by a previous developer, and who can figure out how to use CVS. I don't think those are hard-and-fast rules, just the rules I'd be likely to use if I did it.

In all cases, we should treat roles as sysops/developers as being completelyseparate from our roles as contributors.

Absolutely. Although I have to admit I started rewriting the code because I needed some features to make good Poker articles, and I've fallen behind in contributing. Kind of like the way Knuth took 10 years off to reinvent typesetting rather than finishing his books. :-)

It might be neat to have a link "What is this?" beside the note on the user list. People can click and there we have our anti- elitist propaganda assuring people that sysop status and developer status is just a technical thing, very much open to them for the asking.

Will do. 0