User:Looie496/Signpost on Main page

I want to argue that Wikipedia's Main Page should include a link to the current issue of the Signpost.

This has been suggested before, but it hasn't happened yet. The most common counterargument is that the Signpost is for editors, but the main page is for readers, or words to that effect.

That argument is misguided, for the following reason:

Every reader is an editor.

At least that's the attitude we should project.

Of course not every reader is competent to edit articles, but most are, and the ones who are not competent now may become competent in the future. We should treat all readers as editors who just haven't gotten around to editing yet.

On a practical level, if we want to encourage new editors to come aboard, one of the best things we can do is to treat them as insiders. There might be an intuitive sense that showing people the gory guts of the project will scare them off, but experience says that the opposite is true. When people can see the inner workings of a system, they feel empowered, not put off. The prospect of editing a faceless and impersonal thing is intimidating to many people. Showing Wikipedia as a work in progress, with a community of real people working on it, is more likely to encourage people to participate than to scare them away.

There would also be another benefit. A lot of regular editors aren't aware of the Signpost or don't read it regularly. Linking to it from the main page would help bring it to their attention.

I'm aware that many editors think that the main page is already too complicated, and are dismayed at the idea of adding even more to it. I actually share that attitude -- I'd love to see its content cut in half. But I also believe that a Signpost link would be more valuable than a lot of the material that currently appears there.