"Daniel Mayer" wrote
And to continue writing that encyclopedia we need to keep our financial house in order. Numbers are farily important in that regard. Let't not forget that. :)
Actually we need to do cost-benefit analysis before making _any_ major change. Not just count the money.
It's the road-building argument all over again (familiar in the UK, doubtless less so in the USA). Traffic congestion: if you automatically fight it by building roads, you just get more cars. Since all the server bandwith gets used up over a timescale of a few months, there is no 'solution'. Until, as I say, some indication of saturation is there. Then one could indeed speak of a 'house in order'. The site is not mature, as of 2006 Jan 1.
I would argue that editors are _less_ deterred by the slowness than casual users. Don't get me wrong: when it's fast I can do large numbers of quick minor edits, when it's slow 'just' research stuff and get it posted somehow. So, slowness (I say) differentially discourages people who are coming to WP via a search engine, and who have no patience with a wait. They go and look at a mirror, maybe. Not such a bad solution. History shows they aren't lost forever.
Therefore ... be very careful about offending the editing community (a few thousand, Jimbo says). Geese and golden eggs.
Charles