All posts by Gilgameshkun

I don't have a pony in this race. May I be counted as an abstention?

1. That's not my decision. As a content moderator, I do not deal with user issues, and I do not have the power to affect other accounts' privileges.

2. Rollback necessarily requires content moderator privileges as the power to rollback makes it possible to irretrievably delete article history. Any content moderator would have to be trusted not to unilaterally destroy wiki data.

3. Full rollback privileges are not necessary if you merely want to revert edits, which can be done through articles' edit history pages. These reverts are non-destructive, in that they add a new edit history entry rather than actually deleting any previous history entries. However, page reversion, like any drastic full-page edit, is still easy to abuse, so a user can get in trouble for misusing it.

If you want to edit, then edit. If you want to help people, then help people. I can't help you with popularity - status-seeking falls under the umbrella of personal ambition. Besides, there's no guarantee that an administrator will even be popular. It's a position of responsibility. Rather than thinking of administration as a position that imbues you with more power and status, it's better to think of it as a position that, under healthy circumstances, goes to people who can be trusted with the tasks assigned them - to not treat it like it's a goodie handed to them. It's work. I mean, many dedicated administrators (and editors in general) may enjoy their work, but it's still work. And an ideal administrator has good character, and responds well in a crisis.

When I was offered the position of content moderator, I made sure the change in user privileges were fully mutually understood and that the position would not involve full administrative privileges or require me to mediate user disciplinary issues. Administration is a job I take seriously enough to admit that I am not a people person, and that I have autism, as well as a mood disorder for which I receive treatment, all of which make me believe I would not make a suitable administrator. I mean, it's sometimes said that those most qualified to wield power are those who do not seek it out for themselves, except that I genuinely don't want it at all.

However, in my own even more limited capacity as just an editor with decades of wiki experience, I can opine on questions like these.

Not in my experience, no. The current administrators decide that. The Fandom service largely leaves those details to the current chief administrators of each wiki. So no two wikis can be assumed to have the same power structure.

I think it's about being a responsible, mature, trustworthy, proven editor. I also think there may be inverse relationship between seeking authority and actually receiving it.

When I was made a content moderator, it was not something I ever sought - it was offered to me, I had to consider the offer, and I negotiated the boundaries of the new position (I didn't want too much authority, etc.), and I was given a role appropriate to my abilities and scope of judgment. I have no real ambition to speak of,

Only once on any wiki did I ever specifically request any kind of elevated user privileges - that was on a different wiki with a growing number of edit-locked articles that were adding a layer of bureaucracy that made maintenance increasingly difficult. That request was still turned down.

The best way to receive authority is to not seek it, but to accept it as a calling. The position is ultimately not about what you want, but about what is good for the wiki. If you think you are what's good for the wiki, then you should demonstrate that regularly with good edits, and be humble enough not to desire power for its own sake or prestige. It's good if you genuinely do care for the good of the wiki, but it's ultimately not about what you want or think you may deserve, and it may ultimately be more productive to focus on ways you can better the wiki with the privileges you already have.

That's not how the Leader Board works. It measures and ranks achievements, but has nothing to do with administration.

I've never been competing. My Leader Board rank is irrelevant. Be my guest.

@Wb18368 Pardon?

That was effectively my first answer. But as I also said, it's fun to speculate.

I mean, lots of things are possible, but with only Scrooge mentioned as the basis for April's cloning, it's possible only his genes were used, but tweaked a little. (This comment will get hyper-technical, and possibly get some science plain wrong, and I already figure in advance that the story was likely never going to even approach this kind of geekery, but it's still fun to speculate for its own sake.)

First, one has to wonder whether, as ducks, these characters have an XY sex-determination system similar to humans, or the ZW system found in real-life birds. Why does this matter? Because whereas the XY system has XX=female, XY=male, YY=unviable, the ZW system has ZZ=male, ZW=female, WW=unviable. (Note that these are just a sex-determination systems, as the actual genes that describe the development of each sex exist in the genomes of people of all sexes, and the sex-determination just determines which of the rest of these genes are actively used in development.) See, if, like humans, sentient humanoid ducks have an XY system, then I'm thinking that they could have just replaced Scrooge's Y chromosome with a copy of his existing X chromosome, and with an otherwise identical genome, the clone developed into a girl. But if they have a ZW system, then Scrooge would have two Z chromosomes and no W chromosome, and the W chromosome necessary to trigger female development would have to have been supplied from an outside genetic source.

Yet another possibility circumvents the genetic sex-determination component entirely (such as if X chromosome doubling might not have even been an option): April could actually be a true clone of Scrooge with male chromosomes just like him, but assigned female through epigenetic intervention in her prenatal development for reasons unknown. If they can clone people, I wouldn't doubt Black Heron might know how to do this, perhaps through some kind of prenatal hormone treatment at a very early stage. Of course, if this were true, then when they cloned Webby to make May and June, they would have to have carried out this step again, or else May and June might have developed into boys.

I also vaguely recall the Stone of What Was being mentioned as part of the process, at the very least for making May and June, but I'd have to rewatch for context. Even after watching the finale repeatedly as it aired again and again on Disney XD, I'm sure there's all sorts of stuff I still may have overlooked.

I've given this some additional thought since my last comment.

From a standpoint of genetic diversity, clones are actually more like siblings than offspring, as they only inherit from one parent rather than from more than one; her genes are still about half from Fergus McDuck and half from Downy McDuck, the same as for Scrooge himself and his own siblings. So, if Webby's genes do not actually differ all that much from Scrooge's, they could be genetically screened for medical purposes in the same way as genetic siblings, or perhaps even as identical twins barring the few genetic differences that do exist.

But of course, that's just the numbers of it all. Given their great differences in age and maturity, and that Scrooge was the template for Webby, and that Webby has lived most of her life as a dependent under Scrooge's roof, it seems more appropriate to liken Scrooge as her father.

No, it wasn't simple denial—Bradford was being dishonest with himself. That was evident when he decided to indulge in a moment of what he admitted was petty villainy in trying to kill a member of Scrooge's family right after he had just promised to let them live out adventureless lives. He probably might not have openly admitted as much if not under the influence of the Sword of Swanstantine, but as it amplified what was already inside him, we can only conclude that even a part of Bradford himself saw his own motives and actions as villainous. When the sword was taken from him and he reverted to normal, he went back to steadfastly denying that he was a villain. Bradford Buzzard is DuckTales' reigning king of cognitive dissonance. Fortunately, it seems that, without a Papyrus of Binding, he was never actually all that good at convincing anyone else to doubt what they could plainly perceive; even other F.O.W.L. agents were obviously just humoring him whenever he protested against the appearance of villainy.

I have a thought: I voted to keep the articles separate. But in the event that it be decided to merge the articles, I think the primary article should be Bradford Buzzard. Not only are the other board members his clones, but as the finale and especially Gyro implied, clones are easy to replace, and "Bentley" and "Buford" could indeed have been replaced many times over with successive clones. The only character of any real substance is Bradford.

That is fair.

I just now discovered this poll. I already created a separate Bradford Buzzard article today.

"Family," same as they were before. I don't think the exact genealogical relation is all that significant as it stands. But if you want to get technical, if Webby is to be seen as Scrooge's daughter, than she is first cousin to Donald, Della, Gladstone and Fethry, which makes her first cousins once removed to the triplets.

Of course, even Scrooge and Webby's mutual relation is technically not that simple. Webby was cloned from Scrooge, but Webby sees Scrooge as her "dad." And yet May and June were cloned from Webby, and yet Webby is not their "mother," but their "sister." What's the difference? Scrooge is so much older than Webby, but May and June are of a similar physical and mental maturity level as Webby and Webby herself is still a fairly young child, so it makes a sort of contextual social sense for one cloning to be treated like a father-daughter relation and for the other cloning to be treated like a sibling relation. Still, on a technical level, this is entirely arbitrary. Clones are neither strictly offspring nor siblings, but more simply copies. Even if those copies may have a few modifications (such as a difference in gender), they're still effectively copies.

Compare the case of Magica and Lena. Lena is a magical shadow clone of Magica. But is Magica Lena's "mother?" No. Is she Lena's "sister?" No. She's Lena's "aunt." While an aunt and niece are family, they are not necessarily expected to be part of the same immediate nuclear family, so while an aunt might be considered to have more authority than a niece in a larger family structure, she would not usually be expected to have the same caring familial responsibilities as a mother or sister. I think this was entirely for Magica's own convenience, making it easier to compel at least some of Lena's loyalty while being able to justify a lesser display of concern for Lena's upbringing and welfare. Indeed, I think the truest thing Magica said was that she did not consider Lena to be her family at all, right before trying to destroy Lena's shadow body. Later still, after Magica had been stripped of her powers, but Lena's body had been restored with magic powers of her own, and Magica wanted to claim Lena's powers for her own, suddenly Magica again declared that Lena was "family." That is a kind of relationship, but I wouldn't call it "mother," "sister" or even "aunt." It's something more like "someone please call a social worker."