I really have to come out against putting acknowledgements on the pages themselves. It's /not/ required by the license,
Agreed.
it's /not/ what I would expect someone using our text to do,
That's the crucial point. Previously, I had interpreted the consensus on this list as asking for links back to Wikipedia on every page that uses Wikipedia material. If that's really not the case (and I could live with that), then we should phrase [[wikipedia:copyrights]] a bit clearer.
it clutters the page with information that isn't relevant to most users, it gives a sense to users of the text being a "fixed" rather than "dynamic" thing, and it will create a growing problem in the long run.
The last point, with accumulating credits over time, is a good one.
We're here to serve the readers, not the egos of writers who think writing a sentence or two is a major accomplishment forever worthy of credit. Indeed, we are changing the notion of "authorship" itself, and we shouldn't constrain ourselves to policies that fit the old paradigm.
We have however chosen a license that enshrines these authorship rights.
Another possibility I'm open to is a wiki markup specifically for endnotes and credits
This would be good, or alternatively a Credits: namespace which by default always contains a text like "Wikipedia articles are collaborative efforts; you can find the contributors on the [[History page]]." and then we could credit any other outside sources there.
I would however request that the Printable Version of every article contains these Credits (in a smaller font if desired). Otherwise, printed out copies could arguably be seen as being in breach of license.
Axel