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

[Habj]

I have read the discussion with great interest.

Svwiki started out letting pretty much everyone becoming an admin, and
remained this way a long time. Our most complex troll ever, clever and
mixing good contribution with direct destructive actions, became an
admin, and used the position to "bite people" (not only newbies) -
when stripped of his admin priviledges, he got a lot nicer.

We have several admins who would never be elected if they were
nominted for adminship today - this is the main reason why many of us
wants a system where admins are elected for say a year, not forever,
and my guess we will have this new system running within a year.  I
see a group of admins who speak to newbies "from above"; the message
is "I know the rules here, you don't". They could do the same if they
weren't admins, of course - but my belief is these people would use a
softer tone if non-admins. One or two of those who don't want clearly
unsuitable admins to be removed from office (maybe because this admin
realises he wouldn't get reelected?) tell me "adminship is no big deal
- it is you who are making it into a big deal." It is logikal - if
adminship is no big deal, what is so bad with having some admins who
don't respect other people's views?

If I don't know everyone in the community, I will judge them partly
from other people's opinions. The admin hat gives it's carrier a
certain credibility, earned or not. The response a user gets in
discussions tell me what informal status this person has in the group,
so to speak, but finding someone in the list of administrators also
tells me "this is a trusted member, so maybe what he says isn't so bad
as it first sounded to me". When an admin is being unjust to newbies,
people don't speak up since you don't want to create a fight. There
are other ways of getting a position where your words are a bit
"heavier" than others, but getting adminship is an important one.

The main reason I spent a long time at the swedish wiki competitor,
susning.nu, rather than at Swedish Wikipedia was that I felt treated
badly by a person who wasn't just an admin, but one of the "heavy
names", one of the influentual ones. He felt his adminship had nothing
to do with his actions towards me, and his judgement of me based on
little information...  nothing at all. I strongly felt it had. When
exposed to unjust actions from an admin, you kind of believe there is
the wiki concensus behind it. Why should I expect anything good from
places where people who are elected to some kind of position don't
treat me with respect?

In my eyes, it comes down to - if we keep saying "adminship is no big
deal", does this make the adminship a lesser deal, or do we just keep
saying something that isn't true and thus prevents us from seeing the
reality? Personally, I resigned from adminship without anyone asking
me to do so since I felt I could do more good as a non-admin. I have
my position in the community regardless of admin status, so it doesn't
make much of a difference. In my opinion, it is those whose position
in the group relies heavily on their adminship, who are most unwilling
to loose it.

/Habj