Wikindividualism

Wikimedian philosophy

Community

Anti-wiki

Conflict-driven view

False community

Wikiculture

Wikifaith

The Wiki process

The wiki way

Darwikinism

Power structure

Wikianarchism

Wikibureaucracy

Wikidemocratism

WikiDemocracy

Wikidespotism

Wikifederalism

Wikihierarchism

Wikimeritocracy

Wikindividualism

Wikioligarchism

Wikiplutocracy

Wikirepublicanism

Wikiscepticism

Wikitechnocracy

Collaboration

Antifactionalism

Factionalism

Social

Exopedianism

Mesopedianism

Metapedianism

Overall content structure

Transclusionism

Antitransclusionism

Categorism

Structurism

Encyclopedia standards

Deletionism

Delusionism

Exclusionism

Inclusionism

Precisionism

Precision-Skeptics

Notability

Essentialism

Incrementalism

Article length

Mergism

Separatism

Measuring accuracy

Eventualism

Immediatism

Miscellaneous

Antiovertranswikism

Mediawikianism

Post-Deletionism

Transwikism

Wikidynamism

Wikisecessionism

Redirectionism

+/-

Wikindividualism (sometimes referred to pejoratively as Wikithoritarianism) is a philosophy which values the opinion of certain individual editors over the community, argues that there is no such thing as a community apart from individual editors, and that the collaborative wiki-process works because of rational, reasonable individual editors. It is in direct opposition to Wikidemocratism.

A Wikindividualist is a strong supporter of the principles that Wikipedia is not a democracy, Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, and rules can be ignored. They believe that, in the interests of improving and maintaining the encyclopedia, it is sometimes acceptable to act against the will of the majority of editors. They also argue that because administrators and bureaucrats are chosen by the individuals in the community, they should be trusted to exercise judgment as decision-makers; they agree with the principle that polls are evil, and claim that decisions should be made on the "strength of arguments" made by individual editors, not by majority vote or the irrational will of the collective.

Wikidemocratism vs. Wikindividualism

A Wikidemocrat and a Wikindividualist will take differing general positions on a number of issues.

Voting

• Wikindividualist: Polls are evil. Where decisions are made after a discussion (e.g. in a deletion discussion or a request for adminship) they should be made by the closing administrator or bureaucrat, who should weigh up the "strength of the arguments" and take other users' views only as recommendations.
• Wikidemocrat: Voting is a tool. Numbers do count for something in a discussion, and the closing administrator or bureaucrat should not ignore the views of a majority of editors. Vote counts can be useful in determining the consensus of the community.

Process

• Wikindividualist: Wikilawyering is bad, and rules should be ignored. Processes can and should be circumvented, or disregarded altogether, if they prevent an editor from doing what they think is best to "improve Wikipedia". This includes administrators and bureaucrats in the exercise of their tools.
• Wikidemocrat: Process is important. Because administrators and bureaucrats have technical abilities denied to regular users, they must follow processes, policies and guidelines to the letter in exercising their tools, and respect the consensus of the community. Although boldness is an important principle, so are discussion and consensus.

The role of administrators

• Wikindividualist: Administrators and bureaucrats are chosen by the community, and have demonstrated that they can be trusted. As such, they are decision-makers who should be allowed discretion in using their tools.
• Wikidemocrat: Adminship is no big deal. Administrators are janitors, not politicians; their role is to carry out certain functions that must be restricted to trusted users, but they should only do so within the letter of the policies and with the consensus and agreement of the community.

Justification

• Wikindividualist: The main problems of Wikipedia are inaccuracy and lack of NPOV. If Wikipedia is used to spread misinformation, then the public themselves are likely to make bad edits, even in good faith, if they join Wikipedia. Ideologically-based "mobs" are particularly problematic on certain contentious issues.
• Wikidemocrat: The main problem of Wikipedia is community discord. People are always going to disagree, because there is no inherently "correct" way to build an encyclopedia. Editors can disagree in good faith about a variety of issues, such as how NPOV should be interpreted or which topics are suitable for encyclopedic coverage; there is no "right" or "wrong" answer to such questions. If nobody compromises, then Wikipedia will not be an environment where people can cooperate to make constructive edits, and good editors will be driven away.

Examples

Administrator X is closing a controversial Articles for deletion discussion. S/he notes that there are 20 users arguing for Delete, and 24 arguing for Keep. There is no evidence that any of them are sockpuppets, meatpuppets, or acting in bad faith. However, s/he strongly disagrees with the Keep !voters and regards their argument as essentially a case of "It's useful". How should s/he close the discussion?

• Wikindividualist: As Delete. As an administrator, s/he is trusted by the community to exercise judgment. Opinions are only valid if they are solidly grounded in Wikipedia policies and guidelines; the closing admin should read the arguments and ignore any opinions which s/he regards as invalid.
• Wikidemocrat: As No consensus. Every user in the discussion gave a good-faith opinion and provided a rationale. It is not acceptable to ignore the views of a majority of users in favour of a minority viewpoint. Administrators are not decision-makers; they are janitors whose responsibility is to use their tools to carry out the will of the community. In this case, there was no clear consensus, so the result can be neither Delete nor Keep.