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.
Jimmy Wales the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, the non-profit charitable organization that he helped establish to operate Wikipedia, holding its board-appointed "community founder" seat. In 2004, he co-founded Wikia, a for-profit wiki hosting service. His role in creating Wikipedia, which has become the world's largest encyclopedia, prompted "Time" magazine to name him in their 2006 list of "The 100 Most Influential People in the World". Wales was born in Huntsville, Alabama, shortly before midnight on August 7, 1966; however, his birth certificate lists his date of birth as August 8. His father, Jimmy, worked as a grocery store manager, while his