Tim Starling wrote (regarding my request for the ability to require registration via a confirmed email account):

I started writing a feature which did exactly that. An extra email field in the user table, Special:Userlogin modifications to allow email confirmation, even IIRC a modification to Article.php and User.php to inform users that they can't post because they haven't confirmed. My intention was to use this feature to allow Halifax residents to contribute to Wikipedia if they have a confirmed email address, hence I also made some changes to ipblocks to allow email confirmation to be switched on and off depending on IP address. I got maybe 60% of the way through it before deciding that it wasn't such an important feature for Wikipedia, and I shelved it. I'll see if I can dig up and post what I've done.

That's great. As I stated previously, the Center for Media & Democracy (my employer) has some funds available to pay a programmer to do this. If you're not seeking payment yourself, perhaps we could make payment instead in the form of a donation to the Wikimedia Foundation. If Tim or anyone else here is interested in pursuing this with us further, please contact me on- or off-list so that we can discuss terms.

--Sheldon Rampton