We should try to find the most reasonable default user options possible.
Here's some data from the English Wikipedia (11474 users) on the number of
users who have changed each option from the default:
-----------------------------
skin=1 (nostalgia): 403
skin=2 (cologne): 991
hover=0: 52
underline=0: 2332
highlightbroken=0: 580
justify=1: 417
hideminor=1: 226
usenewrc=1: 362
numberheadings=1: 202
rememberpassword=1: 4735
editondblclick: 147
watchdefault: 213
minordefault: 160
previewontop: 831
nocache: 4
-----------------------------
Regarding the skins, I think Cologne Blue *could* become the standard with
some design fixes, but we should stick with Standard for now.
Considering that previewontop was recently changed to be the default,
there remain two strikingly popular options: rememberpassword=1 and
underline=0. Since most users never change their preferences, these
numbers are quite high, even if they are not the majority.
I therefore think it would make sense to make these options defaults, that
is, to make links non-underlined by default even for anonymous users, and
to remember passwords by default.
Underlining:
Users who like their links underlined can still turn on this option, but
extrapolating from the above, I would guess that non-underlined links are
more popular. Note that we are a very link-heavy page, so the high amount
of underlining on a page can get quite distracting. Links are reasonably
easy to distinguish from normal text when non-underlined.
Remember password:
This option needs to be distinguished from underlining, as it can also be
accessed on the login screen, not just on the preferences screen, and is
thus likely to be noticed by more people. However, I still think this
should be the default. There are users at places where they do not want
their password remembered, such as cafes and changing terminals at work.
What is the standard case and what the exception, though? My guess is that
most people log in to Wikipedia from one or two machines, and that the
browser on that machine is reasonably secure from access by others.
Other users should be security aware enough to tick off the "Remember"
checkbox during login.
Thoughts?
Regards,
Erik