Somehow I missed hearing about wikipedia up until a couple of months ago. I think I had seen it pop up on google searches, but I didn't really explore it until after I heard Jimbo either NPR or C-Span or maybe both. I started off editing by finding a broken link on a Survivor page and have continued editing heavily on Olympics pages and reality TV. As time has gone by, I have read a bunch on the RfA, AfD, etc.
While I'm a newbie here on WP, I've been online since 1994 (ah, the days of lynx). A lot of what I see going on here is similar to what I've seen elsewhere, especially as the popularity has shot up. I'm sure there are people that can remember when there were 800 editors and now there are 800 admins.
It's interesting, especially with this most recent "wheel warring" how my views on userboxes has changed. At first, I thought they were just silly. Then, I added a few to my page. Right around this time was the issue of Kelly Martin deleting the userboxes and then came Jimbo's statement. Up until a couple of days ago, I held the opinion that someone else mentioned where user pages are like cubicle walls at work and people should be allowed to decorate them as they want, but that really isn't my opinion anymore. To me, setting up a system where some userboxes are okay and some are not is always going to create a turf war on where is the line. If user boxes are allowed, there is going to have to be a clear line that says, language user boxes are okay but these types of user boxes are not okay.
On the pedophilia issue ... I find pedophiles disgusting, but even if someone self-identifies as a pedophile, they are not breaking the law with that admission. If there is evidence that they are doing something, like trying to get in contact with children via WP, than there has to be some sort of process to take care of that. I mean, there is a fairly balanced article on NAMBLA on WP. This userbox issue over the weekend was the final thing that fully swayed my thinking on userboxes and if there isn't some sort of guideline, these sorts of things will happen again.
Sue Anne sreed1234