Users page could be more informative as to which reputation [range] is being shown

Question

I got caught out the other day when I visited the Users page (on ELL) for the first time. I expected to see Users listed with their total reputation, a sort of High Scores table, if you will. However, I failed to understand what I was seeing and fired off the following question to ELL Meta.

(I have quoted the original question in this format as I feel that it shows the train of thought of a new visitor to the site).

The question

The Users page is quite clearly showing out of date reputations:

As one would expect, it happens on all pages, not just the first one. Obviously, when you click on a user, the correct reputation is displayed in the resulting user profile page.

This issue must have been raised already, but I couldn't find a question about it.

I have checked this on two different browsers (Chrome and Firefox and two different OSes (OS X 10.8.5 and Lubuntu 11).

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Update - My "bad"

Thanks to StoneyB for the comment...

Note that there's a choice near the top for 'week month quarter year all'; it defaults to rep for the current month, not total rep. – StoneyB

Ah! Don't I feel like an idiot now..? ;-) Although I do wonder how many other people have been caught out by this, upon their first glance? Obviously, once you know, it is quite obvious. Would it not be better to default to "All"? Although I can see that this would be a matter of preference that would vary from person to person. Maybe have a SE wide default that can be set on a per-user basis? Or default to "All" for a new user and then remember the change in a cookie. (OK, I have managed to bore even myself now)

StoneyB's suggestion of a more prominent heading/title,

It'd be nice if the selection posted an appropriate title. – StoneyB

in lieu of a small highlighted button, would certainly go a long way to alleviating the issue.

As this is a SE wide issue and not just ELL, the question has been migrated from SE.ELL Meta to SE Meta.

Summary

To sum up the two issues that I have:

1. Should the Users page first not default to Total reputation and then any subsequent selection of a specific time frame be recorded in a cookie?
2. Could there be a more prominent title/description?

The new title could be placed just below the Users heading saying something along the lines of "Reputation for the Week/Month/Year/All Time" or "Reputation for the Weekly/Monthly/Annual/Total Reputation", depending on the selection on the right, like so (please excuse the god awful font)

Answer 1

I think the existing default (current month) is probably the best of the available possibilities. Granted, if last 28 days was available I'd prefer that, but we are where we are.

"Seasoned" users will obviously soon realize they can easily vary the time-frame, so it doesn't really matter much how the display starts (though one could argue it would be a nice touch if the UI defaulted to whatever you selected last time).

But I suggest what should matter more to new users (and would often interest me personally) is currently active, community-endorsed users. It's not usually very important to know about high-rep users who've not visited the site (or contributed upvoteable content) for months or even years.

The current default can be "skewed" for the first few hours/days at the beginning of a month (not everyone is constantly active), but mostly it does reflect the "current" situation. So my position is...

“It ain't broke, so don't fix it!”