Last modified: 2012-08-23 17:38:16 UTC
Wikipedia accounts provide many excellent editor tools. Wikipedia accounts do not provide some important benefits for users that are strictly readers (rather than frequent editors). I am suggesting some options that should be implemented and advertised as reasons to get a Wikipedia account, even if you are mostly just a reader. - I'm still curious (basically an in-wiki bookmark list of articles the reader wants to read later, an important feature when you find yourself opening dozens of tabs and internal links) - You might like... (provides users with other pages they might not know to read. This could be accomplished, for example, by keeping track of the categories of the pages they visit and showing new/popular pages in that same category) These are just some browsing/reading tools that could motivate users to get Wikipedia accounts in the first place.
I can't believe I forgot to mention this - readers have been demanding a better editing GUI! Everyone always tells me it's too hard to edit wikipedia, probably because nowadays everything is intuitive pop-up menus (where editing wikipedia is a wall of text with even some code). I would suggest, next to the [edit] button in each section, there be a more stylish "post-it" button - so that readers with accounts can leave expandable post-its in the margins about anything from new sources to be incorporated to warning about boring sentences.
This bug is too generic and idea discussion doesn't happen on Bugzilla, please file specific feature requests (each in its own bug) or open a discussion on wiki. (In reply to comment #0) > Wikipedia accounts provide many excellent editor tools. Wikipedia accounts do > not provide some important benefits for users that are strictly readers (rather > than frequent editors). I am suggesting some options that should be implemented > and advertised as reasons to get a Wikipedia account, even if you are mostly > just a reader. > > - I'm still curious (basically an in-wiki bookmark list of articles the reader > wants to read later, an important feature when you find yourself opening dozens > of tabs and internal links) See the "read later" combined button proposal at <https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Collection_Extension_2#Wireframe_Layout_for_placing_the_print_and_Collection_extension_buttons> for instance. > - You might like... (provides users with other pages they might not know to > read. This could be accomplished, for example, by keeping track of the > categories of the pages they visit and showing new/popular pages in that same > category) There are several proposals/discussions/studies about this, see e.g. [[m:Research:SuggestBot_-_Adding_Information_(2011)]], [[m:Research:Effects_of_Feedback_on_Participation_in_Wikipedia/Messages#Directive_Messages]], [[m:Research_talk:Community_portal_redesign#Open_tasks]] (active now). (In reply to comment #1) > I can't believe I forgot to mention this - readers have been demanding a better > editing GUI! Everyone always tells me it's too hard to edit wikipedia, probably > because nowadays everything is intuitive pop-up menus (where editing wikipedia > is a wall of text with even some code). See VisualEditor. > I would suggest, next to the [edit] button in each section, there be a more > stylish "post-it" button - so that readers with accounts can leave expandable > post-its in the margins about anything from new sources to be incorporated to > warning about boring sentences. [[mw:Article_feedback/Version_5]].
