Fred Bauder stated for the record:
I don't know if this idea will ever be used. But I can imagine some circumstance might exist. For example sockpuppets from Microsoft could be restrained in this way should they try to edit.
Fred
From: Sheldon Rampton sheldon@prwatch.org Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 09:01:39 -0700 To: wikien-l@wikipedia.org Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Hateful ban shows that Wikipedia is flawed almost beyond hope
TBSDY wrote:
Terrible idea. They pay a donation and then think this gives them permission to do what they like on the 'pedia. I cannot agree with this idea.
That wasn't my idea at all. What I described was a system whereby problematic posters would be required to pay a small amount of money for every edit they make. Right now they ALREADY have "permission to do what they like on the 'pedia," for free. My payment system idea isn't something I'm proposing IN PLACE OF existing mechanisms for arbiting and restricting vandalism. It would be something IN ADDITION TO.
--Sheldon Rampton
Sockpuppets, from Microsoft or any other large corporation, would love this plan. Microsoft buys entire governments -- we're not going to slow them down by charging them money. At a US$1000 per edit, they could make a tens of thousands of edits before the expense would show up in their bottom line. (See [[milliard]].)