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Wikipedia:Disabling edits by unregistered users and stricter registration requirement/Poll archive

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Wikipedia:Disabling edits by unregistered users and stricter registration requirement

The vote is approximately 8 supporting, 56 opposing. Maurreen 19:38, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Support

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  1. Of course, OneGuy 17:55, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC) See Allowing everyone to register with any e-mail OneGuy 04:28, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  2. I have been advocating a step like this for almost as long as I have been contributing to Wikipedia. Unless Wikipedia takes some policy initiative such as this, it will not only be unable to achieve its objectives, it will begin to deteriorate in quality as serious editors are driven away. Adam 22:33, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  3. WhisperToMe 23:10, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC) - Do as needed - e.g. gradually increase the amount of regulation when seen fit. I do not have anything else than Hotmail and Yahoo, so again, increase as seen fit. I would like to have the proposal broken down in parts, e.g. approve this and this action.
  4. Support. However, I would favor an alternative plan, without restrictions on the E-mail origin, but instead requiring a twenty-four hour period between registration and first edit. If you slow down impulsive anonymous vandals you effectively solve that problem, because few of them will bother registering and waiting around to vandalize. --Gary D 01:39, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
  5. Just common sense. Fred Bauder 15:40, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
  6. Perhaps only controversial articles should have this policy on them; nevertheless, it's a good idea. -YixilTesiphon
  7. I wholeheartedly support. 66.167.236.158 11:24, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  8. Support, as would most anyone who spends precious time labelling anonymous nonsense with delete tags. I'm perfectly anonymous myself, yet my Wikipedia record defines me. ISP numbers introduce unnecessary confusion about Users' identity. --Wetman 14:26, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Oppose

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  1. Would however suppose the ability to temporarily/indefinitely protect pages from anonymous edits. --Rebroad 14:30, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  2. admins/arbitrators and the rest of us appear to deal effectively with trolls, POV pushers, and spammers => the first premise of your argument fails, rendering unnecessary shredding of the rest of the proposal. --Tagishsimon (talk)
    And how do you deal with dynamic IPs and transparent proxy IPs for the largest ISPs in some countries? You cannot block that IP for a long time because it affects thousand of users. Even if currently this is not a major problem, since the place is growing rapidly, the problem would grow when you have thousands of trolls OneGuy 18:08, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Even if currently this is not a major problem. Exactly. When we have thousands of trolls, remake your proposal. Until then please respect my vote as my final word on the matter. --Tagishsimon (talk)
    I respect your vote. But since this page was created to discuss the issue, don't I have right to comment on responses? I am not trying to change your "vote" but express my opinion and clarify the problem for myself at least. Yes, this might not be a major problem right now, but it still is a problem. As an example, I posted some evidence of abuse by the user 168.209.97.34 here. Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/168.209.97.34/Evidence. Someone else posted more evidence against the guy on the same page, but 168.209.97.34 is a proxy server for the largest ISP in South Africa. The evidence posted by the second guy might not have been against the same person. I didn't see an effective solution to dealing with this guy without harming other users who use that ISP. In my opinion, there is a problem here. But of course you have a right to disagree, as you did OneGuy 19:33, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    I would suggest that if the problem is only with proxy servers, then the solution should be restricted to proxy servers as well. Require a user account to use problem IP addresses. Give admins a means of blocking an IP address without blocking user accounts which use that IP address.
  3. Boy, I really admire the effort and the cause, but not the means. I, like most people I know, don't register for things on the internet. I find ways around it, or use BugMeNot. That said, the reason that I started using WP was because I got to try it out the first time I visited the page. That was the kicker. Now, I wasn't an idiot, and I didn't delete an article and replace it with 'boobs'. But maybe in my early edits, I wrote some unkind things, or did some things that are generally frowned upon in WP. My point is that new users who are innocently trying things out can have just as much impact on a page as a vandal (they just don't use the word poopy). Everyone seems to get along just fine deleting these entries, and no one thinks anything of it. If 256.4.82.61 deletes my article, I'm not offended, and I don't blacklist them. I just revert and move on. That said, if it ever got to the point that (1) contributors considered leaving WP because of vandals/spammers OR (2) trolls were creating robots to destroy content faster than we could fix it, then I would be for this. -- Sean Kelly 19:14, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    The problem is not vandals. Vandals don't stay that long . The problem is persistent POV pusher and trolls who are here for months/years without ever leaving. In case of vandals, IP can be blocked for a day or two by admins. That's not a problem. In any case, you have a valid point that people like to try out first before they register. Perhaps these restrictions should apply to only controversial religious and political articles like, say, Arab-Israeli pages. The amount of abuse and reverts there are huge, to say the least OneGuy 19:47, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Hmm... I might be for selectively locking down pages that have these problems, to be decided by an arbiter. -- Sean Kelly 00:53, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    That's not a solution. The POV pushers are persistent. They are back as soon as the article is unprotected. What good is an arbiter if the POV pusher is back again with another ID? OneGuy 05:17, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  4. Oppose. I feel that the biggest problems are caused by POV pushers who are registered users. I also think some/many people would be put off by being forced to register with an ISP-based account. By the way, I deleted the section above that said Hotmail, Yahoo and gmail addresses reveal the sender's IP address, because I don't think they do. Slim 20:26, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)
    I should add that I do support the effort to control POV pushers, and I support the intentions behind this proposal. Slim 20:34, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)
    Exactly. That's my point too. The biggest problems are caused by registered users who are POV pushers, not vandals. However, you cannot deal with these people when the only way you can block them is blocking IPs. IPs cannot be blocked for a long time without effecting other users who are using that ISP. They will create several dozen accounts. Please read what I wrote above about But some of the worst users are registered users, not unregistered users. As for hotmail section, they sure do reveal IPs. I know that for sure, given how many trolls/flame wars I have been involved on USENET and email lists for the past several years. First thing you do is look at the headers. I can tell you for sure all free emails reveal your IP. OneGuy 20:39, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    You're wrong about gmail showing IP addresses. I've just tried it. It does show an IP address but it's not mine.Slim 21:14, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)
    Well, send me email from gmail to oneguy_ks at yahoo.co.uk. And I will give your IP, ... or let met test it myself since I have gmail account. I will post the result on talk page OneGuy 21:56, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  5. Strong oppose: the strength of this project is the ease with which people can freely take part. If you start making it harder for people to take part in the project they're going to give up and go elsewhere, effectively killing off wikipedia. Even after removing vandalism and trolling the vast majority of legitimate edits left behind are still made by unregistered users. Talk about cutting of your nose to spite your face. -- Graham ☺ | Talk 22:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    That's assuming that vast amount of unregistered users (anon is wrong term here; exposing your IP is not "anonymous") won't register. I answered that objection in one of the arguments above. In any case, I don't have a problem with unregistered users per se. I have a problem with persistent POV pushers and trolls who are either unregistered or in most cases registered, but there is no effective way of blocking them if they can create several accounts. They are capable of driving away far better users. Blocking IPs is not a long term solution. OneGuy 22:24, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    You still need to clarify the registration process you're proposing though. Given the above proposed process it would have made registration extremely difficult for me, seeing as I've only ever used a yahoo email address. I am put of by difficult registration systems on websites: other people will be as well. Also where are we going to get the extra admins from to respond to the doubtless many emails asking to be verified as users? (Anons changed to unregistered users in first comment) -- Graham ☺ | Talk 23:05, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  6. This proposal has been rushed too hastily to a vote, especially as the proposal's approval would constitute a major change in practice and philosophy here. I cannot oppose this policy strongly enough -- it violates the idea of the wiki, in my opinion, and would lose us countless contributors. I never would have edited here without the opportunity I had to test out editing without "signing up". Don't take it away from others. Jwrosenzweig 23:15, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  7. Strongly Oppose THIS IS AGAINST EVERYTHING WIKIPEDIA STANDS FOR! What use is a free encyclopedia editable by everyone if you need to register and use an ISP-based email to use it! Not all ISPs have free email. By your rules, I couldn't get an account because I use GMail instead of an ISP's account! Luigi30
    I already answered this email issue in the proposal. I don't mind people opposing, but no solutions to the problems I identified are offered but instead things that I already answered are repeated with no explanation on why are they being repeated OneGuy 06:05, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  8. Strong oppose. And this is bogus in any case. You appear to have attempted to start a "vote" by stealth - David Gerard 23:58, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  9. m:Friends of gays should not be allowed to edit articles. -- sannse (talk) 00:02, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC) (that's oppose, in case you don't get it)
  10. Strong oppose. Sorry Adam–I understand the frustration, having dealt with Shorne over the past few months, but I can't countenance such a restrictive step. Mackensen (talk) 00:03, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  11. *sigh* This is barely worth commenting on. Stringent sign-up procedures take away the entire nature of Wikipedia, without even tackling the real problem. (So you stop Hotmail accounts counting, but what about ISPs that allow 5, 20, infinite e-mail addresses? What about people with vanity domains? What about Another.com?) I'll stick with the Friends of gays should not be allowed to edit articles policy, thanks; at least it actually identifies and tackles a real problem... - IMSoP 00:05, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Posting links to cheap humor doesn't' answer the problems I mentioned. Please respond to the problems I mentioned below on comments section and offer a solution. Anyone can post links to humor, doesn't answer the problems identified here OneGuy 07:29, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  12. Oppose. I apeciate the effots that high risk users make to identify themselvesGeni 00:40, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  13. Oppose. Mark Richards 00:47, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  14. Oppose: you have not thought your requirements through. You specify "Registration ... by ... any e-mail service where someone cannot create hundreds of accounts," which bars anyone who owns his own domain. [[User:The Epopt|➥the Epopt of the Cabal]] 01:31, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    That's not a problem. If someone is creating many emails from his own domain, it can be easily identified by the admins. The problem is only in cases with widely used services like yahoo, hotmail, etc. OneGuy 05:13, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    If that's what the proposal intends, then that's what the proposal should say. However, that's not what the proposal says. It is patently obvious that not enough thought has been given to the wording of this proposal, let alone its destructive effects on our productive and thriving community. [[User:The Epopt|➥the Epopt of the Cabal]] 14:22, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Well, this was some sort of RfC, not absolutely correctly worded "proposal." I first posted it in village pump but didn't get many responses. Later I posted on a talk page of meta.wiki, nothing again. As for your assertion that this proposal will have a "destructive effects on our productive and thriving community", no argument was offered why that would happen OneGuy 15:08, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    You apparently haven't noticed the several kilobytes of arguments against this ill-considered and destructive proposal that fill this page. [[User:The Epopt|➥the Epopt of the Cabal]] 06:08, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Not when you posted that comment yesterday. What about several kilobytes of arguments that I posted? I haven't seen any reply from you in response to the argument that currently it's impossible to ban the persistent POV pushers/trolls from large ISPs (like AOL) proxies and the destructive effect that might have on wiki by disheartening good editors. OneGuy 12:38, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  15. Oppose. I strongly believe that Wikipedia benefits from its open editing policy. Locking the site down in this way will do more harm than good through preventing decent editors joining the site while doing nothing that will stop trolls and POV pushers. Angela. 02:48, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
    I don't believe my proposal would "prevent" decent editors from joining the site. The question is how do you get rid of trolls and POV pushers if admins can't block dynamic IPs for more than a day or two? How do you stop these people from creating many accounts? How do you stop more trolls and POV pushers (thousands more) joining wiki as the wikipedia grows? How do you stop them from driving away many good users by disheartening them? No answer was posted by anyone who opposed the proposal. OneGuy 08:14, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    The answer is that you revert. You revert POV pushers over and over and over again. The theory is that there are more people willing to revert than there are willing to push POV. As long as that remains true, you don't have to sop thousands of trolls from joining wiki, because you will have millions of troll reverters joining along with them.
    I've already opposed above. This is just another comment. Something else to bear in mind is the difficulty for people in some countries of obtaining ISP-based accounts. This will be the case in countries that restrict access to the Internet for political reasons, and either don't make these accounts easily available, or monitor them. Even in the UK (where, of course, nothing is monitored), people can still have difficulty getting access to ISP-based accounts as Internet access over there can be spotty and expensive. On the other hand, anyone can walk into an Internet cafe and edit Wikipedia from there, and that's as it should be, in my view, despite the many, many problems it can cause. Also, as someone else said above, many ISPs offer multiple e-mail addresses so even with an ISP-based account, there's no guarantee people will behave. I totally support the desire to drive persistent POV-pushers out of Wikipedia, but there has to be a way to do it without discouraging good editors too, and without excluding large chunks of the world. Slim 00:41, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
    Well, I already dealt with this in original proposal. The admins could allow people who don't have valid emails user IDs and monitor their activities for a few days to check if they are not trouble users. They can also examine the IP's history before making the decision. Yes, some ISPs allows more than one e-mail, but I don't think they allow hundreds of accounts like yahoo and hotmail. Even if the proposal I offered doesn't solve the problem completely, it will reduce it enough that remaining cases like these could be easily dealt with. OneGuy 05:51, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    That's instruction creep of such a destructive level that I think few users would bother to have done this. I wouldn't. You see, people don't care why we're doing this or that they're more anonymous under a username. They just want to experiment with Wikipedia. As we have told you again and again, very very few users would be here today if this proposal had been implemented from the start. Most if not all of us started out as anonymous users, registering only after a few weeks or months. Johnleemk | Talk 12:46, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  16. Oppose. Edwin 06:19, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  17. Strongly oppose. RadicalSubversiv E 07:58, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  18. Strongly oppose. At the moment we simly don't need this.Wikipedia has grown from nothing into the largest encylopedia in 4 short years. I don't want to do anthing that might slow that growth, and i believe that forcing people to register will do that. The number of trolls and POV pushers is tiny. We should not make policy that will affect thousands in order to deal with the few. Theresa Knott (The snott rake) 10:07, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Would Wiki stop growing if people are required to register? We don't know yet. People sign/register for things all the time on the internet. Yahoo messenger, for example, has millions of users. Some e-mail lists have thousands of users. People obviously signed up because they liked/enjoyed it. Some people subscribe to moderated newsgroups but not unmoderated newsgroups because they don't like flame wars/trolls. If flame wars/trolls/POV pusher successfully drive away good editors, isn't that a harm to wiki growth? That argument has no been considered by the opposing view.OneGuy 14:03, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  19. This completely goes against what Wikipedia stands for. I'm not too sure about the credibility of this vote either. Most proposals give a few weeks for discussion and make themselves prominent on the pump and community portal. Johnleemk | Talk 12:00, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  20. Oppose; things aren't going nearly badly enough to justify this (very draconian) measure --Khendon 13:00, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  21. Strongly oppose. The proposal would manage to lose the major asset of responsiveness without solving any of WP's really significant issues. Charles Matthews 13:52, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  22. Regretfully oppose. I can understand your frustration and sympathise with it to a considerable extent, however, apart from the reasons already expressed above, barring unregistered users would cripple the creation of links between articles in the different language Wikipedias -- I am by no means alone in creating links to/from "foreign" Wikipedias, and I certainly haven't gone to the trouble of creating an account on all 20+ Wikipedias I've edited on. I'm the bureaucrat on cy.wikipedia and notice that a large proportion of edits there come from anons creating links, usually to en, but also de, fr, nl, pl, gl and quite a few others. I would suggest the creation of a "recent changes by unregistered users" option would be of assistance in keeping track of unhelpful edits. -- Arwel 13:59, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    You are right. Registration should not be required for non english wikipedias because they probably have far less contributors and not many persistent bad users. This is however a growing problem for english wikipedia. Also, an alternative solution could be that if you are registered on one wikipedia, the account is automatically transferred to other languages wikipedia OneGuy 15:41, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  23. Oppose; The edit policy we have now is because Nupedia, with it's "approved" contributors had stalled. Your proposal is a tiny step along the path to stagnation. Trolls, vandals and cranks have been around from the beginning, and for every anonymous vandal putting "poo" in a page about a US president, there's a dozen more anonymous users reverting, correcting and adding good stuff. Sometimes they get bored with poo, and actually start making sensible edits. And even if they don't, good users outnumber and are are more persistent than a kid in his lunch hour on a school PC. There may be more vandalised pages in absolute numbers, but as a fraction of the total, I doubt that they've increased. Plus, I don't bother logging myself in if I'm using a work or library PC Malcolm Farmer 14:08, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Please read the rest of the discussion below. We are not talking about occasional vandals OneGuy 15:08, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    Just read Nupedia. Interesting. Of course that kind of policy would lead to stagnation. I didn't propose anything even close to that. OneGuy 15:26, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  24. It would not be a wiki anymore. Ausir 15:15, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  25. I refuse on principle to give out my personal email address to avoid spam and other crap. Sorry Wiki, you can't have it. Contributing to Wiki is fun but I don't get sufficient joy to give up my details. On a counterpoint, Wiki has been getting something out of me for free. In end Wiki will lose out if I stop posting. Revmachine21 15:38, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  26. Strongly, strongly oppose. It would cost us too much and gain us too little. [[User:CatherineMunro|Catherine\talk]] 15:41, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  27. Extreme strong oppose! If you feel so strongly about this, why not set up your own closed Wiki and see it fail from the lack of contributors! I edited anonymously for months before registering, and sometimes still do for certain articles. This will do zero to stop your concerns and will only kill off potential contributors who don't wan't to register. [[User:Norm|Norman Rogers\talk]] 15:54, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    How would it do zero to stop my concerns? It will solve the problems I mentioned because instead of blocking a range of dynamic IPs (that can't be blocked for more than a day or two because it blocks all users from that ISP), you will only need to block the ID that is associated with a valid email (which can be blocked for much longer period without effecting other users who are using that ISP, library, internet cafe, university). It obviously solves the problems (or at least reduces them significantly) of persistent POV pushers/flame warriors. If you have a better solution to the problems that do exist (and I am not talking about vandalism, see comments section), please post it OneGuy 17:11, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    That's trading one problem for another. While there will be slightly less trolls (only slightly; I can think of a million ways to circumvent this in half an hour without spending a cent), the loss of content will be unmeasurable. For example, once I got a scoutmaster to copyedit Persekutuan Pengakap Malaysia. He refused to register (he thought it was necessary to edit), but gladly went ahead once I informed him anyone can edit. You can argue this is an isolated case, but I don't think so. Every time I go on RC patrol, I see hundreds of anons adding lots of obscure information. I think most people choose to remain anonymous for a reason, even if it means exposing their IP. Johnleemk | Talk 18:52, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    I already answered that argument about People like anonymity, the will not register in the original proposal. Please read that. As for your assertion that it will only slightly reduce the trolls/POV pushers/flame wars, I don't think that is true. It would significantly reduce the problem though not entirely fix it. Right now there is no solution to the problem of sock puppets and POV pushers. You cannot ban them at all for more than a day or two. How would arbitrators block a transparent proxy IP used by the largest ISP in South Africa without blocking everyone who is using that ISP? This can potentially drive away far more good editors who are disheartened by POV pushers OneGuy 19:19, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    I already read it. This proposal won't reduce determined trolls by much. At least one persistent one has filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission about several editors here. If he's willing to spend that kind of energy doing that, what makes you think he won't use emails on varying free email providers not blocked and his own domains? These trolls have nothing better to do than waste everyone's time. If they get blocked, they will continue. And as I said, most if not all editors who are driven away by POV pushers aren't suited for a sandbox-type of environment of a wiki. You have no idea how many anons this proposal will affect. Most anons who haven't registered haven't registered for a reason. They prefer privacy, even if it means they give up their IP. They prefer the convenience of staying in the background. I predict that most current anons would leave instead of registering if we switched to this proposal's system. In addition, new users would be largely deterred. I edited anonymously for several months before registering. Johnleemk | Talk 19:56, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    You are free to disagree. I believe that banning POV pushers using valid e-mails would significantly reduce the large number of POV pushers/trolls. If someone continues to find new valid emails, he will be quickly banned again. No problem. Right now you can't ban them at all without banning IPs which blocks everyone using that ISP. People like anonymity? As I explained you become far more anonymous to most users once you register, not when you post unregistered using IP. Thirdly, ok so we will lose some people who would refuse to register. What about losing good editors who have worked on many articles but are disheartened by POV pushers and leave? OneGuy 20:09, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    I'm well aware of the advantages of hiding behind a username (I've read the relevant guide too). The fact is that a lot of people consider the act of registering itself a hassle. Being allowed to edit without an account gives one a taste of what is to come if he/she registers. Denying them this privilege is denying Wikipedia of new blood. In the end, the losses would outnumber the gains. Johnleemk | Talk 21:06, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  28. Oppose. The proponents seem to forget what got us where we are. Eclecticology 17:14, 2004 Dec 10 (UTC)
  29. Oppose Baby and Bath water.--Jirate 18:30, 2004 Dec 10 (UTC)
  30. Ineffective way of dealing with the issue and prevents people who need to experiment before being registered. We need to implement an edit-approval/monitoring system to catch vandalism instead. Jiang 20:04, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  31. Oppose. The problems outlined above may become a real issue once Wikipedia grows further. At this point of time, however, I believe that vandalism and trolling are quite efficiently dealt with. I might reconsider in the future, when the problem indeed becomes unmanageable, but even then, I do not like the idea of preventing anonymous users from editing. There must be another way to resolve this.—Ëzhiki (erinaceus europeaus) 20:13, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
  32. Oppose this, but I would support forcing AOL users, and other proxy IPs, to register before contributing. I would never support banning hotmail/gmail/yahoo accounts. For many people, this is their only e-mail provider. Your answer that "they should be able to talk a developer into giving them an account" is not realistic. Rhobite 20:41, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
  33. Oppose. Strongly. Most (all?) contributors started out anonymously, and then registered after some edits. We would get very few new users unless we strongly, painfully, actively promoted registration. --[[User:Whosyourjudas|Whosyourjudas\talk]] 20:51, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  34. Oppose. A major help to me in recruiting editors is that they can immediately edit the article we are discussing. Most good editors will eventually create an account, to participate in the community. Without encouraging additional editors wikipedia will eventually be overrun by only bad ones. Pedant 21:08, 2004 Dec 10 (UTC)
  35. Uber-oppose. I first did some small edits as an anon, then signed up when I wanted to do some more extensive stuff. To quote the movie 28 Days Later, "No, see this is a [beep] idea. You know why? Because it's really obviously a [beep] idea." Jonpin 00:06, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  36. Oppose. Requiring registration for some select IP ranges might be acceptable, but forcing everyone to do it is excessive. I think the risks here outweigh the benefits. Aerion 00:17, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  37. Form your own website if you want to change the rules. Lirath Q. Pynnor
    Sorry, I just can't resist replying to rude comments like that. Wiki users will vote and decide whether they want to change rules or not. If you have a problem with that, you can start your own web site OneGuy 03:29, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  38. Oppose. This will do little to stop the POV pushers, and there are better ways to deal with the casual vandals. Others have already pointed out the significant downsides. I'll also add that I, too, made my first few edits anonymously. Dave6 01:04, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    This would do a great deal to stop persistent POV pushers/trolls because they can be banned indefinitely. If they create another account with a different e-mail, that account again will get banned if they abuse, until they run out of email accounts or until they realize that they have to behave. Right now you cannot ban these people at all if they are using a large ISP like AOL proxy. You have to ban everyone on AOL to ban one abuser. I don't know why people are having hard time understanding the problem OneGuy 03:17, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  39. [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality/talk]] 02:54, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  40. [[User:BrokenSegue|BrokenSegue]] 02:56, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  41. Oppose. OneGuy, we don't necessarily misunderstand the problem; we oppose this solution. The reason is it substantially changes Wikipedia in order to prevent damage to Wikipedia - and some of us consider that change to be damage to Wikipedia. "He who would give up essential freedoms in exchange for security deserves neither." - Amgine 05:40, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
    By "understand" I was referring to Dave6 who apparently didn't understand how this would help in banning persistent POV pushers. I know some others do understand :)) OneGuy 17:44, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  42. Oppose, good motives, horrible proposal. This would utterly change the nature of Wikipedia. silsor 06:09, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  43. Sean Curtin 06:38, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  44. Strongly Oppose. I think these proposals would destroy the essence of wikipedia. By having stringent sign-up requirements the community would become semi-closed, which goes against the whole idea of an encyclopedia which anyone can edit. As annoying as anonymous vandals are, I'd rather put up with them than damage the ethos of Wikipedia. Quite frankly I think it is this idea of a freely editable encyclopedia that attracts most wiki-users, veering away from this ethic could possibly do the project more harm than any anonymous vandal could do.Rje 08:19, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  45. ...you've got to be friggin' kidding. Go look at Wikipedians in order of arrival and see how many people say, i was editing anon for a couple of months and got sucked in. Oh and another thing, i dont have any "valid" email addresses (ie. non-gamil/yahoo etc) and never have had, and qutie possibly never will, so i would never be able to edit on wikimedia again. The bellman 10:25, 2004 Dec 11 (UTC)
    Both your objections were answered in either the original proposal or the comments below. Please read them. I still want to see an answer to how to permanently ban persistent POV pushers/trolls from large ISP proxies OneGuy 12:49, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  46. Oppose - As stated above, registered POV-pushers who NEVER change their ID and who are taken through the snails pace dispute resolution system are the problem. Your proposal will kill wikipedia, and is against the spirit of wikipedia. Mrfixter 14:59, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  47. Has anyone mentioned the imminent software improvements coming with MediaWiki 1.4? The ability to mark edits as having "no obvious problems" will dramatically increase the capacity of editors to ferret out poor edits, thus making this draconian move unnecessary. Pcb21| Pete 15:19, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  48. NO, NO, NO!! Many highly involved members of the community were once anonymous users and would have been turned away if a registration was required. Vacuum c 15:25, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  49. I don't have anything to add to what has already been said. Tuf-Kat 17:41, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  50. Cheesedreams 19:32, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  51. Oppose. While I can see some benefits in disabling edits by unregistered users (as someone who frequently monitors Recent Changes and sees that around 70% of unregistered edits are either spam, vandalism, vanity or a copyright violation) I can also see various problems with doing this. My main concern is with the restrictions to e-mail addresses - as if a user who only has a Hotmail account is going to take the time to contact an admin just so they can register. [[User:David Johnson|David Johnson [T|C]]] 21:22, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  52. Anti-wiki. --Slowking Man 23:41, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
  53. Oppose. I've seen very good edits by anons. I've seen bad edits by anons. But the consistant POV pushers are almost all registered members. That said, I would have no problem if blocks against ranges of address could exclude all registered members (who are not blocked for some unrelated reason) by a white-list method. It would help if registered members were not blocked from editing in such cases and if anons at those addresses could see some such message as, this block of AOL addresses is currently not enabled to allow editing because of vandalism from these addresses. It might put some pressure on some ISP's. Jallan 02:35, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  54. Oppose. There may come a time when this is the best thing for the community, but it is absolutely not this time. While I am very frustrated sometimes by the inablity to apply effective blocks or bans, I do not think that this problem is so great that it necessitates registering users and banning anonymous editing. →Iñgólemo← (talk) 05:07, 2004 Dec 12 (UTC)
  55. Oppose - open access is crucial to the success of Wikipedia. Better "soft security" measures and the forthcoming article review system should be sufficient to render vandals ineffective. -- Karada 14:14, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)
  56. Oppose - If this had been policy from day one, I would have never been here. And if you are now going to tell me that I'm expendable: well, so is everyone. Who needs Wikipedia, anyway? And most importantly: this would require major justification. Are we overloaded? Is vandalism going unchecked? No. We scale just fine. What Tagishsimon said. I'm not going to be hastily spiteful by saying that if this policy passes, I quit. But that is basically my gut feeling. Ask me again when Wikipedia is ten times as big. Not now. JRM 16:11, 2004 Dec 12 (UTC)
  57. Oppose - reason for opposing is same as above. --Hemanshu 18:59, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)
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