Wikipedia talk:Username policy

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[edit] Confusing user names

I propose that we have a bright line test for confusing user names, specifically a maximum length for user names of 42 characters. Bearian (talk) 15:32, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't have an opinion on the actual proposal yet, but in the interest of making sure everyone's on the same page as to the length: 42 is the length of the longest username of an established user (User:Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The) and therefore it should not be any less and does not need to be any more. --Random832 (contribs) 17:13, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd be fine with a bright line, as long as it's enforced in software (as in, the username blacklist prevents you from registering such a username), not enforced by blocks after the fact. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 18:51, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
You mean he actually references TWO books (Excession, Hitchikers guide to the galaxy) with that username? AWESOME!
So Bearian proposes we are All Through With This Niceness And Negotiation Stuff? But then people with even just marginally longer names would end up Just Another Victim Of The Ambient Morality. They would be forced to make a Dramatic Exit, Or, Thank you And Goodnight
--Kim Bruning (talk) 20:10, 6 May 2008 (UTC) count the lengths ;-)
Well, one could argue that we don't need users to have sentences as usernames. It's not disruptive by the letter, but it is kinda.. odd. Wizardman 23:57, 6 May 2008 (UTC)
"Odd" does not violate policy. Banning "odd" means inflicting one's own personal tastes onto other people. Is regulating other people's user names just because somebody doesn't really care for them really good for fostering collaborative editing? No.ManymerrymenmakingmuchmoneyinthemonthofMay (yes, it's 42 characters) (talk) 07:21, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
It should be more to do with users who have usernames that are more than 42 letters long and are clear gibberish, I do not see any harm in having a username with 42 characters that is easy to read and not confusing. Tiptoety talk 00:01, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
That's true. Like, I blocked the user User:Stupidstupid... (stupid written 9 times), which amounts to 54 characters, both long and disruptive. But there are 40-odd character usernames that are constructive. Wizardman 00:12, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
How exactly is Stupidstupidstupidstupidstupidstupidstupidstupidstupid disruptive? At that length, it sure isn't going to get confused with any other name, and it shouldn't be hard to see that stupid 8 times would be shorter. Honestly, it looks less disruptive and confusing to me than an awful lot of names I've looked at during this discussion. Anybody who doesn't want to write the name can copy and paste it. MMMMMMMM (talk) 21:49, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
Right, Tiptoety. Names with a healthy mix of consonants and vowels, words, maybe a sentence, and keyboard patters are okay, but lengthy, seemingly random usernames, gibberish, should be disallowed because they make it unnecessarily difficult to identify the user. WODUP 07:53, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Do as rspeer says and enforce it with software at the account creation stage. That way we don't have to look like bad guys later on. 42 characters seems to be a reasonable limit, and that's one less thing we'd have to worry about. --Bongwarrior (talk) 08:03, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
I think this 42 character limit idea is just Another Fine Product From The Nonsense Factory ;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 15:02, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Maybe I should have been more clear, but while I do agree that gibberish, nonsense, random usernames (whatever you'd like to call them) shouldn't be allowed, I'm not in favor of a 42-character limit. Usernames like User:Likes Editing Content on the Internet with Web2.0 are a bit longer than most, but it's not confusing at all, and one can easily read the name and identify the contributor. WODUP 17:02, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't get it. User:lllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll would be blocked? (or prevented from creating a username - that'd be okay) but User:ДЂєЉмШЪЮбгЃЗИіЙЌЛФЊПЋЖАБЦЏЯя is okay? You don't seem to be doing anything to stop confusing usernames. Asking for the software imposed length of names is probably a good idea though, and seems to be supported by most people. Dan Beale-Cocks 17:26, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't support it. I was actually laughing, then checked the date, but saw that april 1st was last month. What a strange world! ;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:16, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
Actually an arbitrary limit of 42 characters can create more of the alleged "confusion". Many Merry Men Making Much Money in the Month of May would read more easily (even if it would lose the intended frenetic fun and would fail to reflect that it comes from a speech exercise which is meant to be spoken rapidly). ManymerrymenmakingmuchmoneyinthemonthofMay (talk) 01:04, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
Hi. Long names (like the one above) aren't that confusing, because ones like Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis and WeBuriedOurSecretsInTheGarden are really not that hard to remember. This would mean that any names with special characters or even IP addresses are hard to confusing because they're hard to remember or hard to get to. I'd understand why a name like "nordostersjokustartilleriflygspanningssimulatoranlaggningsmeterielunderhallsuppfoljningssystemdiskussionssinlaggsforberedelsearbeten" or even "!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" would be confusing, but if you didn't want long names, why don't you set a limit in the number of characters you can type in your username, and no such limit for the passwords? Also, please at least give the user a chance to change their username before blocking them! This is the english Wikipedia, so we shouldn't find names like Ontopofahilltherewasalargebrownoxthatjustwentdowntogetadrinkofwaterandittastedpleasent all too confusing, and adding spaces would just make them longer! Please settle on a consensus and make this rule less vague. Thanks. ~AH1(TCU) 17:29, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
I think I'd support a 42 character limit on usernames if (as others have suggested) it's a limitation done by the software. And if we do, I think that the "raw signature" input box in preferences should also have the same limit (42). - jc37 22:01, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
42 is a very strange and arbitrary limit. If you haven't noticed before? The number 42 comes from the length of "User:Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The", which is a culture ship name from the works of Iian M. Banks. Apparently culture ship names are considered valid usernames on wikipedia, so we're pretty sure that such names are typically not disruptive.
Well, I've been constructing several of my posts in this discussion by using sentences that consist of only culture ship names, and only names with lengths of 43 characters or more. :-P
So if you read back, you'll notice that a lot of perfectly valid and good names would be excluded by this odd bright line test. The fact that there were sufficient variations for me to make a cogent (if mildly rude) argument, even though my vocabulary was thus severely constricted... well... that should be enough reason to think up something less arbitrary. :-P --Kim Bruning (talk) 03:54, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
(smiles) how's your shin? : ) - jc37 04:22, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Doppelganger?

How the heck does a doppelganger account prevent impersonation??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by The Unknown Hitchhiker (talk • contribs) 19:48, 20 May 2008 (UTC) O—— The Unknown Hitchhiker 15:27, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't do much, it just prevents that particular username from being registered by someone else. Mangojuicetalk 13:18, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, but having another account doesn't really prevent the username from being registered by someone else. It's just an account...right? O—— The Unknown Hitchhiker 15:27, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
No, once an account has been registered, no one else can choose the same username. Mangojuicetalk 13:39, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Question about Wikipedia in username

I know I've seen this issue addressed somewhere, but are there ever cases where the full word "Wikipedia" is allowed in a username/sig? Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 23:53, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I think it's fine so long as it doesn't tend to imply some kind of special authority. However, the use of "Wikipedia" would very often do this, even unintentionally. Consider User:Wikipedia Editor -- to those familiar, this is just another term for a user, but to someone unfamiliar it may sound like the person is the editor of Wikipedia. There are certainly examples that are non-problematic, for instance User:JoeOnWikipedia or User:HappyWikipedian or such. But I do seem to remember that someone higher up (Jimbo? or the WMF?) had insisted that "Wikipedia" not be included in usernames. Mangojuicetalk 17:12, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Unified login has begun

A heads-up for anyone watching usernames: unified login has been enabled for all users. We're starting to see usernames from other projects automatically created on enwiki.

If you see a surge in the number of apparently "confusing" usernames created, this is why. It is more important than ever not to block a username solely for being "confusing".

(Cross-posted to WT:UAA)

rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 17:42, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that it is at all the case that "it is more important than ever not to block a username solely for being 'confusing'.", and I'm confident that admins are perfectly capable of distinguishing between the type of confusing username that we discussed at length about a month ago, and a name taken from a non-English language or a non-Roman character set. And there has been no "surge" in the number of confusing usernames. --MCB (talk) 20:36, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
I find your confidence misplaced. The block on User:Yaptitasbamasrakaaslatakanka was a "confusing username" block, so there's at least one admin who couldn't distinguish between a foreign language and random gibberish. The SUL process has just started, and most of the people who have heard of it and enabled it so far are English speakers, but this is going to eventually create a number of cases where applying "confusing username" blocks would block someone with a reasonable name in another language. I don't think there's necessarily going to be a problem -- but that's just because we so strongly discourage blocking for confusing usernames now. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 20:52, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
I don't think "we" strongly discourage blocking for confusing usernames, I think you and a small but vocal faction of 3-4 other admins hold that opinion. As a compromise, the idea of adding a request to change or explain a confusing name before blocking is not completely unreasonable, but nonsense like the names in WT:U#Furthermore... will continue to be blocked, and correctly so. --MCB (talk) 00:05, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Somebody has sand in their vagina tonight. -- Ned Scott 06:16, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Ned, that comment was totally unnecessary, and I suggest you withdraw it.
MCB, repeating "small but vocal faction" every chance you get isn't going to make it true. Do you really think it's a productive to think of a Wikipedia policy as being about two warring "factions" that ultimately compete in a poll (assuming you're still pushing for a poll) where one side wins? What kind of prize do you get when you win the policy faction game? rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 09:26, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Admin, Sysop, Bot, Script

We seem to be seeing a lot of "XXXadmin" and "XXXbot" accounts at UAA. Wouldn't it be simpler to just block automatic creation of them in the registration process and direct people to WP:ACC when they try to register them, the same as with usernames too similar to others (or if the user can't use CAPTCHA)? The only real burden would be that real bot accounts would have to be approved via WP:ACC but that's a relatively rare occurrence compared with all the XXXadmin and XXXbot stuff we see here. Who should we approach with that as a proposal for the developers? --MCB (talk) 02:01, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

We could use the MediaWiki:Usernameblacklist. I note that "Admin" is already a rule there but perhaps it could stand debugging. I don't know about using it for Bots -- there's no way to circumvent the username blacklist without an admin's help (but usernames admins create are exempt.) Plus, a regular expression with "bot" will be prone to false positives. Mangojuicetalk 05:29, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Ah, thanks, I see that Admin (etc.) are already there, but a number of the regexes look broken. I'll post on the talk page, maybe someone groks the intricacies of Mediawiki regex syntax better than I do. --MCB (talk) 06:44, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Specification of violation

I think we should add into the policy that admins are expect to specify to a user, when blocking for a username violation, exactly which violation they have been blocked for. We can't expect new users to be mind readers, or expect to help them to understand the username policy. Educating these users will help them to create a more appropriate username in the future. {{UsernameBlocked}} isn't the most helpful in giving a user an exact reason for being blocked and exact reasons would certainly help blocked users. This would obviously only apply to usernames created in good faith. Ryan Postlethwaite 23:59, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Definitely agree, and I just added that to the instructions for admins in the WP:UAA header, which now includes the language "Be sure to specify the reason for the block, using the "reason=" field of the template, and cite the specific reason in the block log as well." That strikes me as the place to put it, rather than WP:U itself, although it could be mentioned there as well. --MCB (talk) 01:30, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that. I agree that it should go into the WP:UAA header, but I think that it should be clearly stated in the policy as well so admins know they are expected to give the specific reason to a user that has been blocked. It's in line with other kinds of blocks - if an admin used a generic reason and templated "disruptive editing" for every editor that acted disruptively (3RR, vandalism, trolling, incivility) it wouldn't be appropriate because it doesn't explain to the editor exactly what they've done wrong - I don't see what's different with WP:U. Ryan Postlethwaite 01:43, 11 June 2008 (UTC)