Just reiterating that discussing individual preferences (not to mention
touching them) is a very bad idea before we have good criteria of some
sort to evaluate them.
Usage stats are a requirement but such criteria are not only about them
because some preferences may be of small harm for many and of great use
for "a few" (like thousands or dozens of thousands of users) who may
also happen to be the most active users, making such prefs a net positive.
Oh, and of course "gadgetization of preferences" means (almost) nothing.
Nemo