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But how does allowing everyone to see IP addresses help with anti-vandalism? There’s already the CheckUser if there needs to be an IP-block ban. https://en.m.w

But how does allowing everyone to see IP addresses help with anti-vandalism? There’s already the CheckUser if there needs to be an IP-block ban. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:CheckUser https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:CheckUser As for privacy, allowing everyone to associate your IP address with your edit history is quite different than only allowing the website to see it. The reason I bring this up is because there have been quite a few times where I’ve wanted to make a quick copy edit, but I don’t, because I don’t want the edit and the name of the article I read to be permanently associated with my IP address. Preferring anonymity and the ability to change identities, I hate having a permanent account for online interactions. I‘ve made a lot of temporary account on various websites, but most of the time it’s not worth creating a temporary account for a tiny edit on Wikipedia. So I don’t bother. Maybe I’m a unique case, but I’m still willing to bet that there would be more interaction from non-logged-in users on Wikipedia if their IP address were hidden. (As a side note, the reason why I’ve stuck with this HN account for so long is because there is a limit to how many accounts an IP address can make before getting banned.)

capableweb 6y ago
I guess you're one of few with a static address, where doing something via your IP can automatically be connected to you as a person. I've made plenty of Wikipedia contributions, but going to "my" user page with my current one, I find none. I don't care about if someone can connect the IP with my contributions. But I completely understand if you're making more "risky" edits and/or have a IP address attached to you like that. Then it makes sense. And if it's too much to create an account for the tiny edit, I guess it'll be left like it is. Some things I see on Wikipedia are wrong too, but the work to verify, archive, link and do the edit, is more than the edit is worth in terms of shared knowledge, so I skip it too. On the other hand, I quite like that you can connect the ASN with edits on Wikipedia. Makes it very obvious what organizations are trying to influence what in which direction. But maybe the information doesn't have to be fully public, require a different access rule than just user.
- surround 6y ago
  I don’t have a static IP (but I do share one), and I don’t really make any “risky” edits. Yet the thought of my online activity potentially being tied back to myself makes me uncomfortable enough to not contribute.
nullc 6y ago
> But how does allowing everyone to see IP addresses help with anti-vandalism? There’s already the CheckUser if there needs to be an IP-block ban. It scales better. Pretty much just that. > Maybe I’m a unique case, but I’m still willing to bet that there would be more interaction from non-logged-in users on Wikipedia if their IP address were hidden. You're not. Though WP would generally prefer you not use throwaway accounts (as would HN, for that matter!). It's unclear how many people it discourages-- a lot of people manage to make edits without realizing their IP will be displayed because they miss the warnings. Users asking the site to delete edits that were accidentally IP-exposing is a not-infrequent support request. Users suffering unwelcome exposure is largely an external cost (except for those support requests, and the invisible long term discouragement-to-contribution).
- surround 6y ago
  Another thought: If anyone can make an account to hide their IP anyways, why not hide the IP of all users? But I guess the answer is that enough vandals don’t create accounts to warrant keeping IP addresses public.
  - nullc 6y ago
    And other users can make an account easily enough to not bother fixing it. Probably on the balance, considering everyone's costs and risks it would be better to make IP edits private. But the decision to do this is made by Wikipedians, and considering just their costs, favours not doing it more strongly.

capableweb 6y ago

I guess you're one of few with a static address, where doing something via your IP can automatically be connected to you as a person. I've made plenty of Wikipedia contributions, but going to "my" user page with my current one, I find none. I don't care about if someone can connect the IP with my contributions. But I completely understand if you're making more "risky" edits and/or have a IP address attached to you like that. Then it makes sense. And if it's too much to create an account for the tiny edit, I guess it'll be left like it is. Some things I see on Wikipedia are wrong too, but the work to verify, archive, link and do the edit, is more than the edit is worth in terms of shared knowledge, so I skip it too. On the other hand, I quite like that you can connect the ASN with edits on Wikipedia. Makes it very obvious what organizations are trying to influence what in which direction. But maybe the information doesn't have to be fully public, require a different access rule than just user.

surround 6y ago
I don’t have a static IP (but I do share one), and I don’t really make any “risky” edits. Yet the thought of my online activity potentially being tied back to myself makes me uncomfortable enough to not contribute.

nullc 6y ago

> But how does allowing everyone to see IP addresses help with anti-vandalism? There’s already the CheckUser if there needs to be an IP-block ban. It scales better. Pretty much just that. > Maybe I’m a unique case, but I’m still willing to bet that there would be more interaction from non-logged-in users on Wikipedia if their IP address were hidden. You're not. Though WP would generally prefer you not use throwaway accounts (as would HN, for that matter!). It's unclear how many people it discourages-- a lot of people manage to make edits without realizing their IP will be displayed because they miss the warnings. Users asking the site to delete edits that were accidentally IP-exposing is a not-infrequent support request. Users suffering unwelcome exposure is largely an external cost (except for those support requests, and the invisible long term discouragement-to-contribution).

surround 6y ago
Another thought: If anyone can make an account to hide their IP anyways, why not hide the IP of all users? But I guess the answer is that enough vandals don’t create accounts to warrant keeping IP addresses public.
- nullc 6y ago
  And other users can make an account easily enough to not bother fixing it. Probably on the balance, considering everyone's costs and risks it would be better to make IP edits private. But the decision to do this is made by Wikipedians, and considering just their costs, favours not doing it more strongly.