Jimbo posted to support Erik's suggestions:
- Allow sysops to check the IP of new* contributors
- Allow sysops to block new* contributors by IP/name
- Have IP blocks expire after a definable amount of time
- Use an additional cookie-based "soft blocking" mechanism that should
fool the technically challenged 5) In order to increase sysop accountability, log all sysop actions in the recent_changes (e.g. user:foo banned, page xyz protected)
Just adding my support for these very sensible suggestions. On first sight I can't see the cookie thing working - it would fool any of my better-informed customers for about 30 seconds - but then again, it would completely bamboozle a good 50% of the others and it can't do any real harm, so why not?