The Cunctator wrote:
Why is a suggestion of authority to newbies a bad idea?
It might discourage or intimidate them from participating. People normally understand that anyone can be a "user" of a site, but usually "editor" means you have to be appointed or authorized.
I think the term "user" helps to emphasize something radical about the wiki concept -- ordinary *users* can edit the site.
It doesn't sound very radical to say that on wikipedia, the editors can edit the site. But it is radical, and intruiging to newcomers, to hear that users can edit the site.
It's only a tidbit of language, though, so if we were starting from scratch, I'd be easy to persuade either way. But we already have a lot of "User:" links, so it seems best to keep things the way they are.
--Jimbo