[Wikipedia-l] Requesting Sysop Status

Thu Nov 14 00:35:47 UTC 2002

Throbbing Monster Cock wrote:
> 
> I am requesting sysop status on Wikipedia.
> 
> Quoting [[Wikipedia:Administrators]]
> 
> > Wikipedia policy is to grant this access liberally
> > to anyone who has been an active Wikipedia
> > contributor for a while and is generally a known and
> > active member of the community.
> 
> I have been active on Wikipedia since October 15th.
> 
> I am a known and active member of the community.

I think "known" is intended to mean "trusted" or 
"capable" in the approximate sense of "thought to have the 
judgement, skills, and intent necessary and sufficient to 
responsibly exercise the powers of a sysop in the best judgement 
of the evaluator most of the time and willing to work with 
others to correct any errors which occur and minimize the
resulting damage to the extent possible".

This is just my interpretation and I admit that it
could easily be interpreted as intended to allow active 
trolls and alleged trolls sysop status.

Indeed, I am an alleged troll and an alleged liar
and I do not think I ever requested sysop status,
yet I am a sysop.  Clearly some lattitude is possible
in application of the stated policy.

<snip contribution list>

I believe that you are an active contributor
and I suspect that much of your contribution is
very solid and valuable.

I think your choice of an account name (and refusal
to change it per other users request) demonstrates
a lack of understanding of the intent of the Wikipedia
project and of the processes necessary and sufficient
to grow a large, stable, pleasant community that can
attract the large effort and diverse expertise and
perspectives required to complete such a massive 
undertaking.

Therefore, I will state that I do not think you
are a good candidate for a sysop at this time.

I hope this does not discourage you from future
participation.  In fact, be of good cheer.  Since
I do not weld much influence around here for historical
reasons, until some type of voting mechanism is deployed, 
my opinion or judgement can quite safely be ignored
in policy matters.  If voting becomes a norm, then
once again I might have some influence in controversial
issues.

Thank you for bringing further attention to the loopholes in 
our policies and policy making processes.  In view of this
valuable service to the community I am willing to reevaluate
your contributions in detail with a view towards 
supporting your bid for sysophood at any time; after
you request deletion or transmutation of your account
name as Ed Poor has with his "Fucking Asshole" non de plume.

Please do not consider this blackmail as I have not
reviewed your article contributions and you have no
guarantee that I will think you ready for sysop status
after doing so.  A lot of people have found the NPOV writeup
and concept confusing in the past and IMO you may need to
hang around a while to absorb the community's current
interpretation of it adequately to wield sys op status
effectively.

Thanks again for your contributions to date, both
in the subject articles and to the policy debates
underway regarding community governance and policy
creation.  I hope you stick around and help us improve
our community, processes, and encyclopedia regardless
of the near term outcome of your request.

Sincerely,
Michael R. Irwin