Most rights on OpenWiki are earned by simply being around, not granted by anybody. Two levels are automatic; the rest are given by an administrator.
| Level | Requirement | What it allows |
|---|---|---|
| Logged out | None | Reading, editing unprotected pages, posting in discussions |
| Registered | An account | The same, plus a name of your own, a watchlist, and the ability to edit your own discussion messages |
| Autoconfirmed | 4 days and 10 edits | Editing semi-protected pages; exemption from most edit filters |
| Extended-confirmed | 30 days and 500 edits | Editing extended-confirmed protected pages |
Both automatic levels require age and edits, so an account created to get around a restriction must wait and then make edits before it qualifies.
| Group | What it allows |
|---|---|
| Patroller | Marking edits as checked in Special:RecentChanges and Special:NewPages |
| Reviewer | Accepting pending changes, so they become the version logged-out readers see |
| Administrator | Protecting and deleting pages, blocking accounts, rolling back edits, configuring filters, granting these rights |
Administrators hold no special authority over article content. The tools are for enforcing decisions the community has already taken; in a content dispute an administrator is an ordinary editor.
The first account registered on a new OpenWiki becomes an administrator, because somebody has to be able to hand out the rest. See Special:ListUsers for who holds what.
An administrator can block an account from editing. Blocks apply to accounts only: page edits record no IP address to block a logged-out editor by, so the answer to persistent anonymous vandalism here is to protect the page. (Anonymous discussion messages do carry the address they were posted from, but that is for attribution, not enforcement.) Blocks are listed at Special:BlockList and logged at Special:Log.