Administrators are Space Wikians who have "sysop rights". Current Space Wikian policy is to appoint new admins when it is felt that the current number of admins is insufficient. Administrators are chosen from Space Wiki contributors who are active and who have been around for a while and are generally known and trusted members of the community.
"This should be no big deal," as Jimbo Wales has said.
Administrators are not imbued with any special authority, and are equal to everybody else in terms of editorial responsibility. Some Space Wikians consider the terms "Sysop" and "Administrator" to be misnomers, as they just indicate Space Wiki users who have had performance- and security-based restrictions on several features lifted because they seemed like trustworthy folks and asked nicely. However it should be noted that administrators do not have any special power over other users other than applying decisions made by all users.
The community does look to administrators to perform essential housekeeping chores that require the extra access administrators are entrusted with. Among them are watching the articles for deletion debates and carrying out the consensus of the community on keeping or deleting these articles, keeping an eye on new and changed articles to swiftly delete obvious vandalism, and meeting user requests for help that require administrative access. Since administrators are expected to be experienced members of the community, users seeking help will often turn to an administrator for advice and information.
List of administrators
So, what's the deal?
The Wiki software has a few important features that are restricted. Of those restricted features, administrators have access to the following.