Wikipedia administrators matter that the powers given to sysops are not given out to everyone." In his book "Wikipedia – The Missing Manual", John Broughton states that while many people think of administrators on Wikipedia as judges, that is not the purpose of the role. Instead, he says, admins usually "delete pages" and "protect pages involved in edit wars". While the first Wikipedia administrators were appointed by Jimmy Wales in October 2001, administrator privileges on Wikipedia are now granted through a process known as requests for adminship (RfA). Any registered editor may nominate themselves, or may request another editor to do so.
History of Wikipedia Wikipedia, describing the latter as "broken beyond repair." By 2005 Wales began to dispute Sanger's role in the project, three years after Sanger left. In 2005, Wales described himself simply as the founder of Wikipedia; however, according to Brian Bergstein of the Associated Press, "Sanger has long been cited as a co-founder." There is evidence that Sanger was called co-founder, along with Wales, as early as 2001, and he is referred to as such in early Wikipedia press releases and Wikipedia articles and in a September 2001 "New York Times" article for which both were interviewed. In 2006, Wales said,