Wikipedia is not a social networking site

I disagree, and here is why: Bible scholarship is unpopular: the fundamentalists bash it, because it goes contrary to their literalism; the usual believers ignore it; the fanatics think it is a trick of the Devil. So, the popularity of a viewpoint in matters of religion does not prove that it is academically sound. If all those who don't care or bash Bible scholarship would be allowed to vote on it inside Bible scholarship articles, they would ruin it. Wikipedia is not a democracy.

I agree popularity does not prove anything. But it's an interesting data point. So popularity should not decide anything (and let's not talk about "wisdom of crowds"), but it could be a tool. A way to express positive or negative feedback could increase granularity of communication, i.e. add a little oil to the mechanism of Wikipedia.

I often like individual things on Wikipedia and would like an easy way to express that, where an actual message would be overkill (example). And I wouldn't mind having things I do on Wikipedia be Liked or Unliked. Feedback can be useful. As an inexperienced editor, sometimes I follow the "Be bold" motto, but I wonder if I should or shouldn't have. If I saw an Unlike from someone who seems to do good work, I would ask them why. If I saw a Like, I might not do anything, but I would feel less isolated and more part of a community.

That this would not be a help in all areas, and especially not in areas where controversy escalates and tempers flare, doesn't mean it wouldn't be useful in some. I don't know whether Wikipedia is a democracy or not, but I am talking about something else, a small feature to add civility and communication in day-to-day matters, often more useful as an individual expression (User A Likes/Dislikes Item X) than as an aggregate (Popularity of X).

PS: The article feedback tool is definitely not the kind of thing I am talking about. "Please rate the article on a scale of 1 to 5 in the following areas: Trustworthy, Objective, Complete, Well-written" (example). It's too heavy-handed, bureaucratic, confusing, single-purpose: "Let's stick loaded questionnaires everywhere! They'll help us produce unreadable reports 6 months later!". Wikipedia can learn from the simplicity and power of successful social networking tools.