 | This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: This essay exists to nudge prospective admin candidates to requesting adminship while simultaneously thanking them for the many things they have (very often) been observed doing. |
Wikipedia administrators, also called admins or sysops, are experienced editors who have earned the community's trust and been given extra permissions, commonly called "tools" or the "admin-bit". For example: they are able to block and unblock users, delete and restore pages or change their level of protection, and grant or remove user permissions like rollback and template editor.
Because of their experience, depth of knowledge, and breadth of project involvement, they are often asked to interpret consensus in discussions that require a formal close or moderate a discussion involving matters of dispute resolution. They may even settle a matter by the authority and competence of their uninvolved opinion. These activities do not necessarily involve using the admin toolkit.
A significant number of Wikipedia users who do not have administrator privileges are seen throughout the project performing similar tasks on the periphery of an administrator's role. Some of these users (called "awot"[a] below) may have determined, on varying grounds, that they will never actually be a Wikipedia administrator. But the positive effect of their presence is highly relevant and a necessary aspect of our project's overall success. And they should absolutely be thanked and told about this!
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