Talk:Requests for comment/Reimplement info action

Number of watchers
Should the number of watchers be exposed? As far as I know, that information is considered sensitive, because attackers could use it to attack unwatched pages. For example, toolserver rules limit the use of such information. Svick (talk) 21:41, 9 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I've never understood the point of restricting it. Without knowing who the watchers are, it's impossible to know if you have 25 watchers who are inactive or 1 watcher who is actively monitoring the page.
 * That said, it could be placed behind a new user right. Limiting it to a specific group of users might change it from expensive to inexpensive. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:10, 9 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, Special:UnwatchedPages requires the  right, normally given only to the sysop group. (Hasn’t also some privacy issues been raised in a similar context before? Not sure.) --Mormegil (talk) 10:08, 10 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Watchlist data is considered private, yes. Only you (or anyone you give your watchlist token from Special:Preferences to) can see your watchlist. There's an expectation of privacy there. But the aggregate numbers aren't very sensitive, in my opinion. Knowing how much a page is watched is a very rough interest metric (i.e., people usually watch a page because they have some interest in it, that's all we roughly know). The side issues about vandals using it are kind of stupid. --MZMcBride (talk) 05:39, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

What is the advantage of displaying this information?
Not to say that I am against it, but it would help if there were user stories or some kind of description of what advantage this provides to people (esp. non-developers) over any current avenues for obtaining such info. Steven Walling (WMF) &bull; talk   22:28, 9 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Can you elaborate on what you mean by "current avenues"? I think if you try to trace the routes needed to get this kind of typical metadata from a page, you'll quickly realize the value of having a dashboard for this info. :-) --MZMcBride (talk) 02:34, 10 July 2012 (UTC)