25 Jul 06 How to Leave Wikipedia
EDIT: Hi, visitors from Anil’s blog. Just added today an entry about why I left Wikipedia. I had been meaning to write this up for a while, but now that I’ve got an A/C, I can actually think in this insane Chicago heat …
Today, I left Wikipedia after two solid years of contributions. I’ll address the philosophical reasons behind my decision at a later date … I have a feeling it may be one of those things I want to write, add to as ideas come and mesh, and only present as a finished product. I may not even bother, as so very, very many have written as to the faults of Wikipedia already.
What I’m going to post here, however, is more of a “how-to” post: my suggested steps for those people who want to depart Wikipedia and then get it as out of their lives as they possibly can. Click on the “read more” link below to read the entire article.
Leaving Wikipedia
First, to “tidy up” after yourself, tag for speedy deletion every single user page and user talk page you’ve created. You can get a list of your active pages by going to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Prefixindex/User:your user name and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Prefixindex/User_talk:your user name. Open each of those pages using the edit link, and replace their contents with this tag: {{db-userreq}}. This will tell the administrators that you wish to delete your user subpage. Don’t forget, however, to also do this not only with the subpages, but with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:your user name and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:your user name, as well.
Second, wrap up your affairs. Do it in the classy manner: don’t make a big production. Remember there are people who have made other choices than you to stick around. But if you are involved in other affairs, dialogues, or processes where your absence will impact things, briefly advise the individuals involved of your departure. Remember, do it like a (sober) Frank Sinatra would: the classy way. Don’t do it like a (drunk) Frank Sinatra would: making sure everyone can hear you as you slam your way out the door. It’s better for people to wonder “Where he’d go?” than to roll their eyes as you exit. In short, do your best to be remembered as a class act.
Third, once the administrators have gotten around to your user page and it’s been wiped clean, edit your user page again, and put this code in there:
<center><br><div style=”align: center; width: 60%; padding: 1em; border: solid 2px gold; background-color: black;”>
”’<font color=”white”>R E T I R E D</font>]”’</div><br></center><center>”’This user left Wikipedia in [the current month and year].”’</center>
There’s a final step before you leave Wikipedia. I liked the idea because it is a failsafe to make sure you don’t go back and embarrass yourself later. There is a user script you can place in your monobook.js file called the WikiBreak Enforcer. Install it …
… and set it for New Year’s Eve 2099.
You may have to log out, log back in, and then do a hard refresh (Ctrl-F5 on Firefox) on the first page you see (the page you see right after you put in your username and password) before it becomes fully operative. Don’t do it unless you’re sure you never want to come back, and don’t do it if you don’t know your way around monobook.js. (Still, it’s not that hard to do.)
Then … hit the logout button. You’ve left Wikipedia for good.
Removing Wikipedia from Your Reading Life
Slightly trickier, but not impossible if you’re using Firefox and Google. Download the CustomizeGoogle extension for Firefox. You’ll want to use its filter to add not only Wikipedia and the various Wikimedia projects, but also the myriad of websites out there that mirror its content.
To start off with, you can filter:
http://*.wikipedia.org/*
http://*.wiktionary.org/*
http://*.wikibooks.org/*
http://*.wikisource.org/*
http://*.wikimedia.org/*
http://*.wikiquote.org/*
http://*.wikinews.org/*
http://www.mediawiki.org/*
http://*.wikimediafoundation.org/*
That should take care of all the various Wikimedia Foundation projects. You can also consult this page to add most of the remaining mirrors out there. If you find later that one’s been missed, you can simply click on the “Filter” link next to the search result to add it.
After you’re done with that, any “filtered” result will still show up in your search results, but as a light gray, non-clickable URL easily ignored.
Edit: You can now also use BlockSite, a Firefox extension which I proposed and Erik van Kempen actually did the real work on and honest-to-gosh wrote (I’m still reeling), to filter out all links to the sites.
Miscellaneous
Be sure to (if you wish) remove any keywords, bookmarks, or search engine configurations that you might have to the site.
And if you’re a hardcore geek with a wry sense of humor, you can always use the “Jer’s Swear Naughty Word Remover for the non-Limbaugh fan” Greasemonkey user script on UserScripts.Org and have it replace any reference to the word “Wikipedia” with a different word … of your choosing. 
That’s it for now.
I’M FREE! 
