I think it's possible to reach a compromise where users can keep their userboxes (even the silly ones) while eliminating (or at least greatly reducing) the potential for creating POV factions. I wanted to get some feedback here before tossing it out to the wolves. The core of my proposal is that anything that doesn't help to create the encyclopedia shouldn't exist as a userbox template. Instead, it should exist as code which users would be free to paste onto their user pages. Thus, to anyone viewing a user's page, the userboxes would look exactly as they do now, but the harmful side-effects (easy identification of POV factions, increased server load, etc..) would mostly be eliminated. Userboxes that do help in building the encyclopedia would be allowed to remain as templates. This would include the Babel templates or anything that concerns a user's skills or expertise. The "approved" userbox template would be listed in central location and any user could add them to their user pages. There would have to be consensus to approve any new templates. The "unapproved" userboxes would also be listed a central location, but they could be added to this repository by anyone. They would exist only as code and an example of what the userbox looks like. This code would have to be free of fair-use images and must not include any categories. Any "unapproved" userboxes that existed as templates could be speedily deleted. With this setup, a userbox stating "This user is a Democrat" would be no different that a sentence on their user page stating that they're a Democrat. The user wouldn't be included in a category and couldn't be identified through Whatlinkshere. There also wouldn't be any concerns about censorship or stifling of free speech. I'm sure this proposal could use some development, but it's a start. Thoughts?

With this setup, a userbox stating "This user is a Democrat" would be no different that a sentence on their user page stating that they're a Democrat. The user wouldn't be included in a category and couldn't be identified through Whatlinkshere. There also wouldn't be any concerns about censorship or stifling of free speech. I'm sure this proposal could use some development, but it's a start. Thoughts?