[WikiEN-l] Simple interface tweak?

Tue Dec 13 15:47:17 UTC 2005

On 12/13/05, John Lee <johnleemk at gawab.com> wrote:
>
> Andrea Forte wrote:
>
> >Has it ever been suggested before that a simple indicator of "how many
> >people are watching this article" could be a useful tool for:
> >
> >users who want to figure out what to trust
> >wikipedians who want to know where to spend their efforts
> >discouraging vandalism
> >
> >Has this been tried? Suggested? Debated?
> >
> >Just curious,
> >
> >Andrea
> >
> >
> It's not exactly new, but I've never figured out why it hasn't been
> explored further.

One of the drawbacks is that vandals would be able to target articles that
have zero users watching them. It's been suggested that instead of exact
counts, ranges would be used for lesser watched articles ("Less than 10
users watching"). Perhaps admins could have access to exact counts so that
they could identify if an article wasn't being watched. Overall, it's a very
good idea that just needs to have the details nailed down.

Carbonite