Wikipedia talk:Username policy/Archive 20

This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:Username policy. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

I keep noting that some of what is on this "Username policy" page is not policy as such (like the "Guidance for new users" section), and some of it is not about usernames as such (like the "Shared use") section. How about making a new page called WP:Usernames (it redirects here at the moment), as a general information page, and then focusing the policy page on actual policy, possibly renaming it something like WP:User account policy (it also redirects here). Victor Yus (talk) 10:58, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Beause there are advantages to "one-stop shopping", and disadvantages to multiplying the number of pages that have to be tracked and coordinated. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:28, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

That's true, but on the other hand, we should avoid mixing random information on a single page, and we should title pages in such a way as to indicate the true scope of their subject matter. How about, then, we simply retitle this page WP:Usernames, to indicate that it is our one-stop shop for information on that topic (not limited to our "policy" on that topic), and try to find another home for those sections that don't concern usernames per se? Victor Yus (talk) 06:33, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Victor, I already told you that I do not want the information spread across multiple pages. It does not matter whether you move "this" part to another page or whether you leave "this" here and move "that" part to another page. I will not agree to any proposal that splits this information across multiple pages. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:30, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

But what do you mean by "this information"? It seems the information we have on this page at the moment is a fairly random combination of (a) general information about usernames; (b) policy about inappropriate usernames; (c) policy about not being allowed to share accounts. But EXCLUDING (except in summary) policy about use of multiple accounts. It seems that at the very least we should rename it to WP:Usernames, since it includes (a) and (b) and not just (b) (and there's no reason why a policy page has to end in "...Policy" anyway - many of them don't). But if (c) is to be included as well, then we are broadening the scope of the page still further, so we should call it something like WP:Use of user accounts. And if that's to remain the scope of the page, why exclude the information at WP:Sockpuppetry, which surely belongs under that scope just as much as (c) does? Victor Yus (talk) 13:06, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Completely agree with Victor Yus (talk). Newcomers and IPs wishing to register must have a fast-track to what they need to know. I can recall my reaction to this article when visiting for information, in my early days; I quickly moved away from it and used my actual name. Sincerely -- Gareth Griffith-Jones (talk) 10:54, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Victor, I want (a), (b), and (c) on the same page. When you are creating your first account, you need to know all of that. You need to know what a username is, i.e., "(a) general information about usernames". You need to know that some usernames are not permitted, i.e., "(b) policy about inappropriate usernames". And you need to know that accounts are one per human, not one per company or one per classroom, i.e., "(c) policy about not being allowed to share accounts".

By contrast, when you are creating your first account, you don't need to know that you should not create a dozen and hold fake conversations with yourself. I've no objection to offering a separate "fast-track" summary as part of (for example) WP:Introduction, but the existence of a simplified "highlights" version does not change the fact that we need a page that contains all the information about creating your first account. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:24, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

In the Wikipedia:Username policy#Consider leaving well alone section I changed "Assume good faith" to "assume good faith". But I've been reverted have a look at some pages, I can't find another example of assume being capitalised. Does anyone have an objection if I change it to the sentence case standard (that is, lowercase)? Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 09:19, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Sure, if you rephrase or repunctuate so that it isn't at the start of a sentence. Victor Yus (talk) 11:52, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Oops, sorry about that. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 12:02, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Concerning this diff. How can a university domain be faked? Most browsers see URL domain names. Sorry about the time stamp I left at WP:REALNAME. :) I was in a hurry, and did not notice.

See: Domain highlighting - Microsoft Windows. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:48, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

It's easy. It could be as simple as Crichtonedu.com ... Harvardedu.org ... one can never use the internet to vouch for someone's credentials. dangerouspanda 16:00, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

That's not exactly the truth. Example: OTRS asks copyright donors to contact them via an e-mail address with the domain of a verifiable website. See this page. That domains can be spoofed for unwitting victims is a concern but not a reason to throw out the veracity of the entire practice. Respectfully. NTox · talk 16:46, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

dangerouspanda. What you wrote makes no sense. A university domain can not be faked. Harvard has a website:

http://www.harvard.edu - Harvard's website.

http://www.Harvardedu.org - not Harvard's website.

Only a moron would confuse the two.

People can put URLs, including their website URLs, on their user pages here. The Wikipedia guidelines do not block that on user pages. In fact, for people using their real names, it should be encouraged. So that there is less impersonation occurring on Wikipedia. We can link to Domain highlighting - Microsoft Windows. This will help those who do not understand how URLs work. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:04, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

I agree that the URL argument is specious. And, although man-in-the-middle attacks are possible, https makes them much more complex. To me, the bigger issue is that different universities have different standards about what users can say in their web pages. At Cal Poly Pomona, every student gets web space, and anyone can claim whatever credentials they want (at least until they are caught). Accounts do get hacked, as well. It all comes down to what we want to verify.--Curtis Clark (talk) 21:02, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

We should encourage professors using real names to link to both their own website page on the college site, and to the page listing all the professors in their department on the college website. --Timeshifter (talk) 17:07, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Because I've become cynical about this, I have to ask what would it gain them? (Not that I'm opposed, and I'll probably do that myself just for grins.)--Curtis Clark (talk) 04:48, 13 September 2012 (UTC)

WP:REALNAME should link to the top of your user page. That should discourage most people from using their real name. :) See the top of my user page for my attitude about Wikipedia lately. It is overrun by morons who drive away innumerable editors.

Since I try not to waste time fighting morons and their tagteams and enablers (see WP:Randy in Boise) I am not going to spend much time editing WP:REALNAME either. Others can decide what to add to it. I have enjoyed discussing things with you, though. For those who are interested this discussion started here: Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Verifying editor identity. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:09, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

If you're calling the admins and others who watch/edit this core policy page "morons", you should reconsider your line of thinking/action. It was rather obvious from the signature you put into your first edit to the policy itself, that policy-management might not yet be your forte. It was - as per discussion - rightly reverted. Interesting that you would link to VPP discussion after this one, as opposed to at the very beginning. dangerouspanda 16:56, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

(unindent). dangerouspanda. I said "overrun by" not "run by" morons. You don't revert something solely because of a misplaced timestamp. You remove the timestamp. Not quite sure what you are saying about the link to the VPP discussion. Sounds like some vague paranoia to me on your part. Here is a possible addition to the policy:

I find that my suggestions for changes to policy and guidelines sometimes get implemented. I have found though that in this area it may take a long time, and so I make the suggestion, and move on. --Timeshifter (talk) 11:09, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

It is against the policy??? I only want to know --82.139.5.13 (talk) 15:47, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

The numbers within a username would not be against policy. If a user with 666 within their username who constantly connected, promoted and associated the use of their name with obvious overtones would probably have considerable community involvement and scrutiny. Mlpearc (powwow) 16:01, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

There is a discussion at WT:UAA that has had few responses. Opinions are requested. See this section. NTox · talk 01:55, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

There's also this one if you like, too. NTox · talk 02:03, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for looking at this problem, NTox, and sorry for the delayed response; I wanted to create Template:uw-softestblock first and get some initial reactions before I said anything. I've noticed several times over the last couple of years that the editfilter results weren't getting monitored as closely as they used to be. I've gotten more involved in the past month, and I think my position hasn't changed: most people who do gnomish work on WP (like me) simply aren't willing to do high-volume work in areas where WPians are divided on the best course of action. Many WPians feel that blocking for any reason runs the risk of being bitey; others feel that not dealing swiftly with new editors who are (or are likely to become) promotional just makes a bad problem worse and turns a big pile of work into a bigger pile of work. I thought I found a solution to this particular problem three years ago when I created and pioneered Template:uw-softerblock ... I kept a close eye for four months on WP:UAA and CAT:G11 (promotional pages for speedy deletion), and I found that, as soon as it was clear that someone appeared to be editing on behalf of a business, organization or website, a quick block with a nice message was the right way to go. That approach minimized both downsides: I didn't see a single promotional page that I had deleted re-appearing at CAT:G11 during those four months (checking several times a day), and I don't remember any complaints from the people I blocked that I had been too bitey, probably because the message wasn't bitey and didn't treat the block as a big deal, just as a request to create a new account that represented them as an individual. IMO, Template:uw-softerblock has morphed into the kind of message that I was trying to avoid ... it implies that they've made some huge mistake and give them all kinds of links, implying that they need to educate themselves on a bunch of policies before they attempt another edit. I've been using a new template this month, Template:uw-softestblock. I'll continue to keep an eye on CAT:G11, but I haven't been active in blocking recently so I won't recognize some "serial offenders" that some of you may recognize and that may need to be dealt with more sternly. I encourage anyone who feels like putting in the time and who has a good memory for the serial offenders to check my block log ... if you see anyone I'm not handling appropriately, please feel free to change the block parameters, and let me know. Note that softestblock is missing some links and some language that some feel are required for any block notice; I'm going to fight to keep it just as simple and non-threatening as possible, but if I lose that battle, then I lose, and that's okay. - Dank (push to talk) 14:46, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

P.S. Of course, I'm only using uw-softestblock where it seems appropriate ... few edits (so that WP:CHU isn't likely to be worth the trouble), at least one very recent edit, and nothing too obnoxious in evidence, such as search-engine-optimization or serial spamming. - Dank (push to talk) 18:34, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Oops ... all that, and I forgot the most important bit :) I'm not saying that since it worked 3 years ago, it has to work now. This is an experiment to generate data, so I'm watchlisting every single deleted promotional page to make sure that they're not re-created. I don't want to do anything that undermines our effectiveness against spammers. If there are any re-creations, I'll report that at the end of the month and we'll tweak as necessary. If anyone wants to join me in using uw-softestblock, please keep good data on the results so that we'll be able to show people that what we're doing is actually working (or not!) - Dank (push to talk) 12:03, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I'd like to continue using uw-softestblock; there haven't been any re-creations of pages we don't want re-created. User:Reaper Eternal added the standard language "If your username doesn't represent a group, organization or website, you may appeal this username block by adding the text {{unblock|reason=Your reason here ~~~~}} below this notice.", and I reverted. The template currently says: "If I can help you with anything, please log in to your new account and ask on my talk page. Thanks for your understanding."; if they've got a problem with what I've done, that seems like sufficient encouragement for them to tell me about it.

There's an objection that if you don't "read people their rights" when you block them, that may be seen as heavy-handed or unfair. For me, this is exactly the point ... if you give people an appeals process, that suggests you've just convicted them of something ... which sends exactly the right message for most blocks, and in my view sends exactly the wrong message for the kind of blocks that are really just an extension of the account creation process, letting people know that the perfectly reasonable username they just picked is not one we allow on Wikipedia. (This doesn't apply to User:GetStuffed of course ... they really should have known better.) The people I'm blocking with uw-softestblock haven't committed an offense (by selection of that username ... they may have created deletable pages, but that's best handled by deletion warnings and procedures). I believe that telling them they have the right to appeal, which implies they've been sanctioned for an offense, sets completely the wrong tone for a blameless brand-new user. I'd rather just leave the friendly invitation to ask for help on my userpage if I can help. Of course, this only works if I don't actually screw up ... but it's not rocket science to figure out that "Widgets Inc." or "GlobalCorp" followed by a company link or company description is not their real name, or an allowable alias, and if it's not clear-cut, I don't use uw-softestblock. Is this acceptable? - Dank (push to talk) 23:23, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

Followup: WP:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-11-12/News_and_notes, suggesting that the courts in the EU may wind up assisting us in combatting promotional editing, is a bombshell, and may wind up affecting our warning messages, so I'll stop my experiment for now. I still welcome any feedback ... personally, I haven't seen any downsides of uw-softestblock so far, only upsides. Not one of the promotional pages has been re-created, and two of the people I blocked responded on my talk page ... based on my earlier experience with softerblock, I think the odds that they would have responded after softerblock are lower. - Dank (push to talk) 16:16, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Does anybody besides Dank and I have an opinion on {{uw-softestblock}}...? Reaper Eternal (talk) 14:40, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

At first glance it seems inappropriate - according to policy we should not block an account (however touch-feely-softly) just because it has a promotional username (and I still think that as a matter of common sense, such a username should not be a factor at all). Victor Yus (talk) 14:47, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Please check my block log, and see if I've blocked anyone that you don't want blocked. - Dank (push to talk) 18:11, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Well, taking at random the one at the top of the list (User:Dolphinsafari) I don't see any reason to block them at all. Of course there may be deleted promotional edits that I can't see - but in that case you're blocking them primarily because of those edits, not because of their user name. Victor Yus (talk) 20:06, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

The question of when edits are promotional is a little broader. I'll list all the arguments I know at User talk:Dank#Promotional edits, and maybe we can reach an agreement and report back here. (I like your close of WP:Requests for comment/COI, btw, I expect we'll be able to reach some kind of meeting of the minds.) - Dank (push to talk) 20:57, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Follow-up on the EU case: apparently, that case hinged on people claiming that they weren't working for the corporation when they were, so that case isn't relevant to blocking for promotional usernames. I'll get back to work. Please discuss, here or on my talk page. - Dank (push to talk) 05:19, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

On Template:uw-softestblock, and AFAIK this deals with the three objections I've heard so far: although I think softestblock could be more widely useful, I'm going to start applying it only to the users who show up at Edit-Filter 188 (meaning they've justed created a page that's roughly the same as their username) and only if their page has just been speedily deleted (by me, in some cases). In these cases, I'm fine with a link to our conflict of interest guide and a message that they can request an unblock, and I've added that language to uw-softestblock. - Dank (push to talk) 18:49, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

As far as I can tell it still seems to have the main weakness that I've been talking about all along - it implies to the user that the problem is their choice of username, whereas the real problem (the thing we want them to change if they plan to stay here) is their promotional editing. The wording of any template ought to emphasize this, and not waffle on about the secondary matter of usernames. Victor Yus (talk) 19:00, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Per our username policy, neither shared accounts nor usernames that are being employed to represent a group, organization or website are allowed. Judging from what happens when users complain about being blocked, there's no broad disagreement with the policy among the people who make these calls, and anyway, as an admin, I'm required to follow policy (in the broad sense ... including IAR) when I use the tools. If you start a discussion on changing the policy and succeed in changing it, I'll follow the new policy. - Dank (push to talk) 19:22, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

But breaches of these username rules are trivial compared with the matter of promotional editing behavior. If these users are going to come back and contribute positively to Wikipedia, then it matters little what they call their accounts, but it does matter whether they change their behavior. So the thing we want to communicate to them above all is that they're not supposed to use Wikipedia as an advertising board - that's the actual problem that's the reason for their block (or should be). As I've already said, any username problems (except the grossest sort) can be sorted out without resort to blocks in the first instance. Victor Yus (talk) 19:42, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Currently the username policy is not clear whether the real name of a dead person may be used. The policy does say either way, however given that the reason for it is "as a precaution against damaging impersonation" it would seem that the name can be used is the person has died.

I propose changing the first sentance in the second paragraph to

Do not edit under a name that is likely to imply that you are (or are related to) a specific, identifiable, living person, unless it is your real name.

and the third paragraph to

If a name is used that implies that the user is (or is related to) a specific, identifiable, living person, the account may sometimes be blocked as a precaution against damaging impersonation, until proof of identity is provided.

Opinions on this? Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 03:17, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

Why should there be encouragement for people to use the names of (say) well known but controversial dead people? Is there an example of a helpful editor not being able to use their preferred name because that name was the same as that of a dead person? Johnuniq (talk) 03:31, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

One of the main places this is an issue is that a specific, identifiable can be anyone who, for example, has a Wikipedia article. One of the big places that you can look for an example of this is the request an account process, we don't create accounts if there is a specific person (above other hits on Google, especially when that person has their own article). I had one earlier today which the requested username was the same as a person who has been dead since the mid 70s. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 05:04, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm a little surprised by the link added in this edit. I agree that the linked content is helpful (and I know it was inserted as a result of a discussion shown above, but here we have a policy (carefully crafted, presumably) linking to a user page that could change without review. It might be safer to link to that section of a specific version of the page. -- Scray (talk) 22:30, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Please consider highlighting the "do nothing" section of policy, perhaps by moving it to top of page.--31.127.3.97 (talk) 17:13, 22 December 2012 (UTC)

I think this, this, and this were bad blocks. It seems erotophobic and prudish and entertains the idea that the genitals are somehow shameful. Why block soemone for "vulva", "testicles" and "scrotum" but not for "ear", "finger" or "foot"? Any thoughts? Pass a Method talk 10:53, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

None of these blocks are more recent than early 2010. Could you bring up a more timely issue with which to accuse Wikipedians of prudery? Danger ^{High voltage!} 23:32, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Well User talk:Boobnipple was just indefinitely blocked for vandalizing and was also said to have violated the user name policy. How about PurpleNipple, would that be OK? "Boob" is slang, so I can see "Boobnipple" as being out there. Biosthmors (talk) 21:12, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

User:Nippleteeth seems like an OK name. Biosthmors (talk) 21:14, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

It is important to note that names like "Vulva" or "Testicles" are not blocked simply because they are considered offensive. To the blocking admin, they may not be offensive at all, but are blocked because there is good reason to believe they would be disruptive. If my name was "Penis", do you think I could expect others to consistently treat me with warm and professional courtesy? At the least it would be a garish distraction from our collaborative goals. NTox · talk 22:13, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

All three of those are good blocks in my opinion. It may be a bit prudish to block those usernames, but it is entirely appropriate to do so because most people are a bit prudish. Those three usernames violate Wikipedia username policy by being likely to offend other contributors, seem intended to provoke emotional reactions, and/or show a clear intent to disrupt Wikipedia. Anything that unambiguously refers to sexual organs, sexual acts, or excretory bodily functions is likely to meet at least one of those criteria. Peacock (talk) 22:51, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Peacock, do you have any evidence that most people are prudish?

Ntox, a better indication of possible disruptiveness would be actual contributions.

Danger, time frame is irrelevant here. Whats important is the precedent it sets. As far as i know there are no rules indicating genital-related usernaes are bloackable hence these blocks fall ouside of wikipedia policy. Pass a Method talk 01:06, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

In short, the username policy is applied inconsistently. We have administrators with names such as Bongwarrior and SlimVirgin, both of which have been previously cited as possible violations of username standards. And for a number of years, usernames that were deemed "confusing" (using non-ASCII characters, pretty much) were regularly blocked. Unified login only made matters more complicated.

I agree with others that if there are recent blocks that seem inappropriate, you should feel free to bring those up. It's probably not worth re-examining every old block, though, unless we'll be taking a much more systematic approach. --MZMcBride (talk) 20:58, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Hello all, There has been some discussion at the notice boards (and at least one block) on this topic and I promised to bring forth an RfC on the topic (see my talk page for details). Here is the basic question:

• How, if at all, should an elementary school teacher have students edit wikipedia?

There are a number of options including:

1. Don't have elementary students edit Wikipedia.
2. Have them each edit using their own account
3. Have the teacher create a single role account that he controls and have the teacher be the one taking the final responsibility for the edits.

The problem with number 1 is that this would deny potential outreach future editors at an early age. But on the plus side it would keep potentially bad edits away from the encyclopedia and would keep these minors away from potentially inappropriate situations and people.

The problems with number 2 are legion. Most notably it could run afoul of COPPA and similar laws in other nations. In any case, it is likely that doing this would be against the policy of many schools (including the one my children go to for example). The advantages are pretty clear (clear attribution of work, fits within our standard mode of operation), but I don't think this is likely to be viable.

The problem with number 3 is primarily one of attribution. If a class works together on an article, who owns the copyright? Are we opening Wikipedia up to some type of IP lawsuit because the person who typed in the material might not be the sole author of the material? If this is a concern, I suspect we can get some type of waiver signed by the parents and students if needed. Not sure how viable this is.

Seems like we need to either find an exception to WP:NOSHARE or just accept that we are stuck with option 1.

Thanks and I'd love to hear your thoughts: Hobit (talk) 21:08, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

• It is currently acceptable (as far as WP policies are concerned) for numerous people (children or adults) to edit WP from the same shared IP, and it is already impossible to differentiate which IP user made which edit. So whatever the attribution issues are with a shared account (I don't think there are any, to be honest, but if there were) we already accept them for shared IP's. Whatever copyright issues there are with children editing in general (like, I don't know, them not being old enough to legally agree to the terms of service), we're currently ignoring them anyway by allowing children to edit with their own non-shared account, or via IP. Having children share an account does not add any new attribution issues that we do not already accept in other circumstances. I believe it is well within our stated mission (encyclopedia that anyone can edit) that we allow teachers very broad discretion to handle this in the best way they see fit. As long as the teacher understand the drawbacks (one vandal could get the shared student account blocked), they are in the best position to decide how to handle local laws, whatever forms the parents and students have signed, their school's policies on students signing up to accounts on the internet, how the teacher wants to track edits, etc., etc. Therefore, I think we should make it policy that clearly identified shared accounts for students, linked to their teacher's account, should be an exception to WP:NOSHARE. --Floquenbeam (talk) 23:14, 3 February 2013 (UTC)
• The IP policy is based on the premise that by editing via an IP, with full warning and all, the IP editors are waiving their copyrights. I'm not sure what our legal situation would be with a role account such as you propose. I'm not being obstructive; I'm being cautious in a litigious era. --Orange Mike | Talk 23:33, 3 February 2013 (UTC)
  • Two objections to that, one practical, one theoretical. Practically speaking, we are not at risk of litigation from a student not getting credit for making an edit to WP from a shared account. So we're 100% safe approaching this from the perspective of what is best for the student, teacher, and encyclopedia, not from the perspective of how we keep from getting sued. Theoretically, where is an IP editor told that they're waiving copyright? I'm not 100% sure that's even correct, but if it is, the only warning I saw when I made an edit as an IP just now is that I should create an account if I want the edit "associated with an account". Nothing there about "waiving copyright". --Floquenbeam (talk) 23:44, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

Elementary school (primary school) pupils are typically five to fourteen years old, and are probably too young to be editing Wikipedia unless they are supervised by a responsible adult. Facebook, YouTube and other social networking sites have a formal 13+ policy when creating a user account.[1] Edits by a teacher supervising children should be clearly flagged as such.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 07:53, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Option 2 is S.O.P. at ACC. Mlpearc (powwow) 08:27, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

What would you suggest in terms of flagging those edits, Ian? An account that is obviously in use by student with acknowledgements on user/user talk pages that also link to the teacher's account (and vice versa)? ˜danjel [ talk | contribs ] 08:31, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

There could be a new template similar to Template:User alternative account name. When creating an account of this kind, it should be made clear that:

• The account is used only by a teacher supervising children at school.
• The teacher will accept standard Wikipedia terms and conditions and accept responsibility for edits made by the account.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 08:41, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

The teacher would have had to have agreed to terms in signing up for the account, but, that generally seems sensible to me. I hope that you don't mind my indenting your comment for readability. ˜danjel [ talk | contribs ] 08:45, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

• I opposed the idea of #3 in the relevant AN thread, so I'm sure Hobit isn't surprised to see me here, but I have a number of objections to role accounts along the lines #3 proposes.

1. Attribution. An account is used by one person so that any writing can be attributed to the creator of the content. We don't have a provision for "the creator of this content is one of fifteen people, no way to know which, but whatever", and we shouldn't, because that's not how our licensing works.
2. Maturity. The fact is, most elementary school students aren't mature to edit Wikipedia, whether because of safety reasons (not aware it's not safe to share their identity) or regular old age-related competence (doesn't understand sources, doesn't understand good writing, etc). There are definitely exceptions to this, and we welcome them as editors, but if they're mature enough to edit Wikipedia, they are mature enough to understand how to be safe on the internet and run their own account. If they're not mature enough to carry themselves safely on a project like this, they should not be editing Wikipedia under any account, because the account name won't protect them.
3. Child protection. There is a very, very good reason we oversight instances where minors give away information about their ages or school year: that information can be found and used by child predators who will zero in on minor editors. An entire account devoted to nothing but edits from minors is dreamland for that sort of predator, no matter how much a teacher attempts to supervise. I cannot stress enough how much our Oversight team already works to protect minor editors, and it alarms me greatly to hear any proposal that suggests we invite more unprepared, possibly immature children to edit. Again, if they're mature enough to understand how Wikipedia can be used safely and how to follow our policies, they're mature enough to have accounts. If they're not, they have absolutely no business here until they are.
4. Accountability. If Child #15 vandalizes with this role account, how are we expected to cope with that? We cannot block only one user from using a role account, which means the first time this account misbehaves - under the control of anyone - it would have to be blocked until we're confident that that user either no longer has access to it (how will we know that, if we know the account password is being handed around to multiple people? Children aren't great at security and not sharing) or resolves to change their behavior (how will we know that it's them, when any user could be at the keyboard at a given moment, pretending to speak for any other user of the account?).
5. This wouldn't fix parental worry. If a parent is worried about their child editing Wikipedia, it's probably because of reason #3 above: "Anyone could see and talk to my child out there! How do I know if it's a safe environment?" Sharing an account that's identified as an account used by children - or even sharing an account that doesn't identify their age group - does nothing to remedy this, because Wikipedia is not a "safe" environment in that sense. We're not babysitters. We cannot guarantee that their child won't give away too much information using any account they have access to. We cannot guarantee that no one will approach their child on Wikipedia, with good intent or bad. We cannot even guarantee that their child won't be able to look at "dirty pictures" - hell, they can do that without an account!

• So to put it in terms of Hobit's "choices" above, I choose a combination of numbers 1 and 2. Is the child mature enough to be safe and productive and non-disruptive on Wikipedia? If so, have them get an account. Are they only some of those things, or none of them? Unfortunately, they're not competent to edit Wikipedia at this time and we look forward to seeing them when they have aged a few more years and can understand how to do things.

  Also, let me point out yet again that we are not bound by COPPA. COPPA has nothing to do with Wikipedia, Wikipedia is not in violation of COPPA by letting children under 13 edit, and COPPA (or any other local law) cannot compel us to disallow accounts for minors. If a school's policy is that children under 13 can't participate on certain websites without X-ing or Y-ing, we're not bound to accommodate that rule in any way. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 21:38, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Replies to individual points:

1. I keep seeing concerns about attribution, but no one explains why this doesn't concern us when someone edits on a shared IP. The edit is attributed to the account, just as IP edits are attributed to the IP address. And if attribution is really an issue, why do we allow the couple of shared accounts the WMF asked that we allow? Do edits from the WMF and their PR firm violate our license?
2. I share your concern about unsupervised or insufficiently supervised children editing. But this system would make it significantly easier for a teacher to supervise many students, much simpler than trying to monitor a dozen (or more) accounts. Unlike typical individual accounts created by children, this type would give us a direct line to someone responsible for them. Current policy allows children of any age to edit from their own account, supervised or not; how can this be better for us than an account we know is supervised, and whose supervisor we can more easily contact?
3. Similar to #2, this is a much easier situation to protect children, and makes it an order of magnitude easier for a teacher to monitor communication to/from the account, making sure incoming email (if any) goes to their email address and not a child's, essentially preventing any unmonitored communication with the child. A shared, monitored account would be safer for the child than an individual account.
4. Yes, if someone is vandalizing from the account, you block the account until the teacher says they've dealt with it. If it keeps happening, then you indef block the account because the teacher was unable to monitor it sufficiently. Easy-peasy.
5. I think it does ease parental worry (per my response to #3), but in any case it certainly doesn't harm it.
6. We may not be "bound" by COPPA, but that doesn't mean we should automatically reject ideas that allow people who are bound by it help keep their students safe while they edit.

--Floquenbeam (talk) 22:24, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

My points about child protection are not leading to the idea that we should make it easier to monitor unprepared minors when their teacher is determined to have them edit - they're that if you're not positive your student is ready to edit safely and constructively, there is no form in which they should be editing this project. If you're taking a chance that your 7-year-old student might screw up and tell another editor his age, or that your ten-year-old student might do something that garners emails from a pedophile, you're doing it all wrong by putting the children at risk for that in the first place. Monitoring students' edits to make sure they understand the finer points of how to write for Wikipedia? Yep, absolutely, that's what the Education Program's Ambassadors are all about. Monitoring them because you're not sure if they might put themselves in literal danger or go on a vandalism spree? That's when you don't let them get into that situation in the first place. All putting them under one account does is make it one-stop shopping where we can't tell who's being safe and who isn't, or prevent them from doing it.

As far as how role accounts differ from IPs, my understanding is that IPs are marked and represented as shared - that is, someone reading a history page will know that "the content came from this IP, but the author isn't identifiable beyond that." Accounts, as policy says, "represent your edits as an individual". That is, if you intend to edit in a manner that includes multiple contributing parties, you do it by IP (but in a manner consistent with our SOCK policy); if you intend to be one-person-one-attribution-history, you do it by account. By editing from an account, you are agreeing that "hey, I'm one person, I'm the person operating this account, and anything that comes from this account is my work". If five or ten - or even just two - people start sharing an account, suddenly that's not the case anymore. Any edit from that account is "I know I'm representing this work as my own, but in fact it may or may not be my own, because there is no 'my own' to this account". At any rate, I'll see if I can find someone better-versed in the intricacies of CC-BY licensing to weigh in here later on and help us out with understanding the finer points.

You question about WMF and shared accounts, I can address part of it, but need you to provide more detail for the other part. WMFer accounts are allowed because they're not user:Wikimedia Foundation (that's a banned sockpuppet account, ignore the bluelink), where any edit is from some unidentified party there. They're user:So-and-so (WMF) - a format explicitly allowed by policy because it allows edits to be attributed to a specific person. Similarly, though I've never come across edits by the WMF's PR firm, I assume the accounts would be of the form user:John Doe (PR Firm) and not user:PR Firm. As far as "the couple of shared accounts the WMF asked that we allow", I'm not sure what accounts you're referring to here, so I'm sort of going to take a guess, and hopefully if you meant something else you can reply with more detail: If you mean things like User:Oversight, that's not a shared account that anyone edits from. It's more along the lines of a placeholder account, used solely for its email address. I'm an Oversighter, and I don't have access to that account - it's simply not shared in any sense that applies to this discussion. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 23:01, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

My children don't edit WP, but if their teacher told me they were going to have a class project that involved editing WP, I would allow it if the account was actively monitored. This is one way to monitor it, without a tracher trying to monitor 1-2 dozen individual accounts. There is no switch that gets flipped in a kid's brain that goes from "immature" to "mature"; children grow, and spend quite a number of years in the grey area of partial, slowly growing maturity. I don't think our approach is to wait until everyone is "fully mature", and even if we wanted to (and sometimes, believe me, I want to!), we currently simply don't have the means to do it. This approach would at least make our jobs easier. The person in the best position (besides the parent) to decide whether someone is mature enough to edit WP, and how much and what type of editing they are capable of, is a teacher. I'm not saying WMF should go out and recruit more 12 year olds, but if a teacher has a plan, we should given them a tool to help them.

The accounts I'm thinking of are User:WMF Legal and User:Schwartz PR. Unblocked, labelled as role accounts, with edit histories. --Floquenbeam (talk) 23:33, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

I've asked MDennis/Moonridden girl to give us the benefit of her genius on these matters if she can. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 00:00, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

The debate is increasingly about copyright issues rather than child protection. In theory, a five-year-old could claim copyright over something that they had written or drawn. Anyone who contributes to Wikipedia should be capable of understanding the basics of a Creative Commons license, and there are some problems with the concept of allowing a teacher to attribute CC on behalf of another person. Wikipedia is not bound by COPPA, but nor should it encourage children under thirteen to set up user accounts.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:05, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

• Comment Speaking in volunteer mode - because Creative Commons requires that we "must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor", I myself think that there is nothing to preclude a group identity as long as members of the group sign up for that. (GFDL is not so clear, but did permit "entities" to stand as authors.) To be absolutely safe from a copyright standpoint, I think we would best require all users of a role account to affirm that they intend their contributions to constitute a joint work (see NOLO on joint works). I would be somewhat concerned with knowingly allowing minors to take part in role accounts due to the fact that minors may in some circumstances disaffirm a contract during their minority or within a reasonable time afterwards. In liaison mode I'll note that WMF has been willing to accept contracts with minors because they are not willing to limit the site to adults. But knowing the possibility, I myself am a bit concerned that a role account that specifically includes minors may constitute some challenges if one or more of these minors successfully chooses to exercise that option. (I think we would have a stronger case with an IP because we had no explicit knowledge that minors were using it and because the edits represent individual copyright. I think the minor would be more likely required to identify individual contributions that must be removed than with a role account, where we may be required to delete everything. My opinion merely. IANAL. Potentially wrong.) In terms of why the WMF has permitted some role account editing, I can ask for an official answer, but I strongly suspect it's due to the "in the manner specified" business and also because of the whole issue of corporate copyright ownership. Theoretically, when I edit on behalf of the WMF, the WMF owns the copyright (the contract of some employees of the WMF stipulates differently). Any editors who used Schwartz PR were likely also contributing in the course of their employment. Let me know if you want me (as liaison) to get more information on the WMF stance on role accounts in general or these specifically. :) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:31, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, MRG, that was very clear and very helpful. If I wasn't clear before, I wasn't complaining about any WMF-approved role accounts, I was using them as evidence that they weren't automatically forbidden by our license. I, for one, don't need any more info from WMF on why they permitted these accounts.

I now understand the increased level of hesitation regarding a role account used by minors: it appears to boil down to the possibility that someone might later disaffirm the license agreement, and we would not know which edits they're claiming. But as MRG's post makes clear, this is a grey area, and WMF is pushing the boundary a little already. The benefits need to be balanced, and the boundary between good idea and bad idea is fuzzy. Now, different people may come down on different sides of where that fuzzy line should be, and if consensus is that it should be in a different place than what I think, I'll live with that. But I hope this at least shows that licensing is not an automatic dealbreaker for a role account for minors.

From a practical point of view, I think this hesitation is not enough to outweigh the benefits of having a supervised role account. I can't imagine any encyclopedic edit that a minor would later choose to disaffirm the license for; and any individual nonencyclopedic edits can be oversighted, just as they are now. The benefit of having a supervised account outweighs this slight risk, IMHO. --Floquenbeam (talk) 13:29, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

If everyone uses a shared account, then it essentially means that they all edit under the same pseudonym. If three people edit under the pseudonym "John", would you then have to write that the work was made by "John, John and John", or would it be enough to write that the work was made by "John"? That is, would you have to know how many people you have who are using the same pseudonym, and repeat the name the same number of times, or would you be able to simply list the pseudonym once? --Stefan2 (talk) 00:12, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Just once, exactly like you would list the author of Coke.com as "Coca-cola, Inc." rather than "Coca-cola, Inc., times however many employees and contractors worked on some bit of that website". In effect, your three humans become a partnership that is doing business as "John". WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:41, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

My thoughts: although I think shared accounts (at least between consenting adults) should be permitted in appropriate circumstances, in a normal situation we encourage people to edit under individual accounts, and this should apply to children too. The teacher could supervise these accounts, and also instruct the kids as to what precautions they need to take (a valuable lesson in itself, given that these same kids are going to be setting up Facebook accounts and so on with possibly no adult oversight whatever). Also, by doing it that way, the children are learning more fully what Wikipedia editing is really like. If they're too young to be trusted to heed teacher's warnings in these matters, then I suspect they're too young to be let loose on Wikipedia. Victor Yus (talk) 13:48, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

• #2, per Yus; if they cannot manage their own account, they should not be on Wikipedia. KillerChihuahua 14:15, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Probably my last significant comment here, as I don't want to look like I'm monopolizing it. I was drawn to this discussion for 3 reasons, but the only one pertinent to the subject at hand is this: The idea that we should be flexible, and try new things to see if they work. Be less rules-oriented and more outcome-oriented. Be more welcoming to teachers trying to engage their students in a worthwhile project. Not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. When I first saw the shared account that started this discussion in action, it didn't seem like the best way to do it, it just seemed harmless. But as I thought more about it, I realized (a) the teacher has thought about this more than I have, and it might actually be a really good way to do it; and (b) more important, why do we have to stand in the way of a teacher trying it out? If a teacher wants to have them set up individual accounts, encourage them. If they want to set up one group account, encourage them. If they have a different idea not mentioned here yet, encourage them. Everything on Wikipedia is about following rules; it shouldn't be. --Floquenbeam (talk) 15:14, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

• I just want to note that in addition to the shared accounts mentioned by Floq earlier (e.g. User:Schwartz PR), current policy allows bots to be maintained by multiple operators, so the bot account can reasonably be called a shared account, and as far as I'm aware there have never been any problems with that. The shared student account model discussed here seems like a similarly reasonable exception to the "no sharing" policy. 28bytes (talk) 15:31, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

One of the rules of contributing to Wikipedia or Commons is that you cannot subsequently change your mind and claim copyright over the material. It would be interesting to know how many adults are aware of this, let alone children. It is hard to point to any case where a person changed their mind about a CC contribution to Wikipedia, but lawyers are inventive people. I have changed my mind on this issue and believe that teacher supervised accounts are probably not a workable idea per WP:NOSHARE.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 13:42, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

Hi folks. As the legal issue with shared accounts is, unsuprisingly, a major potential reason not to allow the "classroom accounts" for elementary student classes, I dropped a note asking Philippe to provide some guidance [2]. Thanks, Hobit (talk) 19:29, 6 February 2013 (UTC)

• The option that started this whole discussion was left out, and may be the safest. That option is where the students' editing is confined to the user space of the students' account and supervised by the teacher. This was the situation of the account that started all this discussion. It caused no problem for anyone or for the encyclopedia when it was active. --Bob K31416 (talk) 01:07, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

I agree that the originating scenario has done no harm to WP. I wonder if there is a way to address the copyright claim concerns so as to prevent potential harm to WP. Is there a way to reliably obtain copyright waiver from students without them signing up for an account? What liability, if any, arises from conceivably non-free content in userspace? ClaudeReigns (talk) 04:25, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Seems like the copyright waiver in this case is obtained from the account holder, the teacher. If there is a legal concern regarding Wikipedia violating the copyrights of the students, then when registering the account, the teacher could certify that the parents or legal guardians of the students have waived the copyrights of the students. The legal staff of Wikipedia might be consulted on this before proceeding, to see if there is a concern and to fill in the details. Regarding getting waivers from parents of minors who edit Wikipedia, it just occurred to me that there are minors, e.g. teenagers, that edit Wikipedia and AFAIK, copyright waivers from their parents are not required when they register an account. In any case, I suggest asking the legal department about these issues instead of speculating. --Bob K31416 (talk) 10:21, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

• I think where we start to get into problems is where the teacher has one account, and his students have another, but one that he has access to. One issue I'm surprised no one has brought up here is handedness...i.e., a teacher screwing up can blame it on his students, and vice versa pbp 15:26, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Simply allow a multiple account in this case, which the teacher is responsible for. I've seen users announce multiple accounts on their user pages and I presumed there was a legitimate process in Wikipedia to do that. --Bob K31416 (talk) 15:43, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

Given the options and problems pointed out I am in favor of 3. They have few grounds to stand on in a copyright crisis if they go up against Wikipedia and what kind of primary school child will be complaining about copyright? You think they'll even know about copyright at their age? I', not so sure about 2 as that could lead to a lot of Sockpuppets with the levels of maturity that we'll be dealing with at these ages. Most teachers think WP is rubbish anyway. "Oh anyone can just edit it" they say. MIVP - (Can I Help?) (Maybe a bit of tea for thought?) 18:49, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

• Comment. One variation of the second option is a set of "modularized accounts", with usernames such as "User:Smith1", "User:Smith2", "User:Smith3", and so forth, as abbreviations for "Mr. Smith's class: student #1", "Mr. Smith's class: student #2", "Mr. Smith's class: student #3", and so forth. (The numbering of students can correspond to the alphabetical class list.)

—Wavelength (talk) 17:43, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

• Option 2: We have (or shouldn't have) no business with the age of our contributors. A 5-year-old might be as mature as a average adult, and a adult might have the maturity of a average 5-year-old, although it is unlikely. A teacher should not receive attribution for another's work, and option 2 is better for blocking as there will be no (or less) than blocking the class' account. ~~Ebe123~~ → report 01:57, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

I agree, Ebe. Age shouldn't matter, and if we accept a role account, how do we block it? RedSoxFan2434 (talk) 16:47, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

• I hope it's not too late, and please forgive me, but I've not read every response above before posting this opinion:

My opinion has been, and still is, that everyone should have their own account. This is because of the fact that if I were to share an account with my sister, for example, then one of us could get "blocked", yet the other not be "blocked". I say this because blocks affect the person, not the account, and therefore the block would affect the user, not the account. This means that if my sister got blocked from editing for vandalism, I could claim that she was blocked, not me, and that blocking my method of editing is wrong. Yes, that can be dealt with by a simple policy that says "any account used by a blocked user is also blocked" in addition to any policy re: student group accounts. Another issue is the much brought up one of attribution. A student cannot enter into a contract with their teacher to allow the teacher the rights to release it to Wikipedia in most jurisdictions. Also, the teacher claiming responsibility for other's edits is just wrong. Attribution would be hell if someone decided to sue, or otherwise enter into legal discussion even with the WMF over an edit they made 10 years ago as part of a 1st grade class. Thirdly, the parents must know that this is going on, or if they don't, the teacher should be talked to. If the parents know what's going on, I highly doubt that their concerns, if present, are alleviated by having only one account for all of them. There's still (in theory) only one kid accessing the account at a time, and therefore that kid is the "owner" of the account for a while. If the kid sees warnings, block messages, other users messages, etc., they're doing so on behalf of the account. This also brings up another issue, of warning/blocks. How do we make sure that whichever student a warning is intended for gets the warning? Are we supposed to expect that the user will see it or be notified of it? I see no real way to make that happen, feasibly.

Now, I feel that the best course of option is Option 4: none of the above. I feel that if any school of mandatory education (in the US, grades K-12) wishes to take part in a Wikipedia editing project, they should be told that they shall keep permission letters on hand in the case the WMF wants to see them, and that way the WMF legal or a functionary can review them for the community if necessary. Secondly, the teacher will keep a monitor of what account each student is using, and make sure that that student is logged in while editing at all times. Thirdly, each student will have their own account. On the userpage of the account, there will be a message that says something along the lines of "This user is editing from this account as a part of an education project. If any issues arise, please also notify their instructor as well as them." Their instructor will promptly stop any student who is given a warning until such time as they explain that user the rules of Wikipedia pertinent to why they were warned. Fourthly, the teacher will provide a list of the accounts editing, and confirmation of having permission letters on hand, to ArbCom or WMF Legal (as the only two en.wp entities that can handle private information such as that) for review prior to any of the accounts involved making edits.

Sorry for the large wall of text above, but that's just my ideas. gwickwire^talk_edits 21:09, 15 February 2013 (UTC)

• I think Option 2, or having the students continue to edit via IP, is the only viable option. Option 3 creates more problems than it solves. Speaking of solving problems, exactly what problem are we trying to solve here? Have we seen many issues with teachers assigning elementary students to edit here and have those issues prevented the editing from taking place?  7  23:41, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

7: Yep. User_talk:MrJuddsStudents (which would be option 3), blocked after consensus suggested IAR in regards to the use of the account at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive244#Violation_of_WP:NOSHARE (which, incidentally, was initially raised as harassment to distract from Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Epeefleche). ˜danjel [ talk | contribs ] 05:25, 18 February 2013 (UTC)

danjel, how is raising the question harassment? I was informed about the issue, I called the question at AN seeking a discussion if the account was allowed per the Username policy. Please demonstrate where I stopped you from enjoying wikipedia by making threats, repeated annoying and unwanted contact, repeated personal attacks, intimidation or posted your personal information that had not previously been disclosed by yourself. You keep using the word when the question has not exceeded the threshold for using the specific designator. Hasteur (talk) 16:37, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

Simple solution - use a special case of #2, in which the teacher creates an account CLASSNICKNAME and each student has an account CLASSNICKNAMEStudent01, CLASSNICKNAMEStudent02, etc. Optionally, the teacher can work with administrators to salt or lock-as-redirect the student's "user" and "user talk" pages, disable email, and take other actions necessary to protect the children from harm. If done with heavy controls by the teacher and with some level of cooperation by Wiki-Admins, this will achieve the project's goals of attribution and not endangering minors. Furthermore, it would not require a change the Username policy. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 03:32, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

As we don't allow e-mail addresses, what about Twitter account names ... @whatever ... they can be promotional, could be related to an org, or an attempt to gain more "followers". (✉→BWilkins←✎) 10:23, 22 February 2013 (UTC)

Isn't that already covered? Block them if the username is promotional (obviously linking itself to a corporate twitter account, trying to gain more followers, etc.), don't block if it's not (personal twitter account, etc.). --Conti|✉ 15:40, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

I propose removing the word trolling as seen here. It appears vague to me. Pass a Method talk 18:34, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

Rather than delete it, what would be a better example to give of a username provoking an emotional response? Personally, I think it's a useful example. —C.Fred (talk) 18:41, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

a lot of GLAM professionals are being welcomed to wikipedia with an indefinite block for username violation. wouldn't it display AGF more by encouraging a rename before blocking? clearly the gray warning box is not being read, but that's a system problem, not a user problem. Slowking4^{Farmbrough's revenge}⇔ †@1₭ 23:18, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

Seems I have a "global account" that seems to "attach" *all* Wikipedia "local accounts" - *except one*: the "plwiki" local account for some reason - I think, but am *not* 100% sure, this particular local account was "attached" to me some time ago - nonetheless, my attempts to recover this local account have not been successful - ie, I've not received any email (at either of my email addresses => drbogdan@yahoo.com or drbogdan@comcast.net) whatsoever re a way to update my lost password - if possible, any help to clarify this situation, one way or another, would be greatly appreciated - thank you in advance for your help with this - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 22:03, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

If you haven't already, try "merging" all of the accounts with your username by visiting Special:MergeAccount. What this does is unify every account of that username with the same password and e-mail address of the account on your home wiki. I understand that the form will ask you to enter the password and/or e-mail address of any account that does not match. You might also try resetting the password on the plwiki account by following the instructions at pl:Special:PasswordReset. Otherwise, it is possible that someone else actually owns that account. NTox · talk 00:37, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

@NTox - Thank you *very much* for your reply and comments - they're *greatly* appreciated - yes, I may try your suggestions at the first opportunity - Thanks again for your comments - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 01:39, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

I wanted to make this username "ILikeToSitInDarkCornersAndMakeDolphinNoises" and it stopped me yet theres nothing here that says why it would be blocked :(

24.187.191.151 (talk) 01:52, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

There's a 40-character limit. All the best, Miniapolis 02:14, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Is "vanished user" permitted in the username of a non-vanished account? Peter James (talk) 19:38, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Any names like that would have to be examined on a case-by-case: basis, but most of them would probably be too misleading. The key is to assess whether or not a lot of people would be led to believe the user went through the vanishing process when they did not. If: so, the name is inappropriate. In a case like this, it may not be a 'block on sight' violation, but still deceiving. NTox · talk 21:18, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Is "non-vanished user" permitted? Lotje (talk) 12:49, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

It wouldn't be misleading (or if it was, not in a way problematic for other users). I asked the question because I had seen an account, still in use, with a name "Vanished user" and a series of digits - I don't know if it's a renamed account or not but the user has been editing for two months (and 50-100 edits) with that name. Peter James (talk) 13:57, 22 June 2013 (UTC) Would other editors be discouraged from discussing an issue with, or notifying the user because the account appears to be vanished? Peter James (talk) 14:09, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

I know this is a slightly old thread, Peter, but...If someone was formally vanished, and has returned, they are no longer vanished - the username is therefore misleading and problematic, plus it means the person has violated WP:VANISH - they would need to be blocked and/or renamed back to their original account name. Bureaucrats should be made aware of the specific situation (✉→BWilkins←✎) 16:55, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

I asked because I'd seen a "vanished" username where the account had probably not vanished - it looked like the user had created it with that name. Peter James (talk) 17:41, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

So, who was it? I'd need to see the userid to help ... you can send it to me by e-mail instead (use the e-mail this user function) (✉→BWilkins←✎) 18:19, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

While reading over the user name rules, I came across this sentence: "From May 27th, all account renames will need to be made on Meta." Since it doesn't say which year, should the "From May 27th," just be removed? —Anne Delong (talk) 17:25, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

Originally it was going to be that time this year, but the timetable has been pushed to August. I've updated the main page. NTox · talk 18:26, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

In the first sentence, "consist of" is unclear, as there can be names that coincide with company or product names without having any connection, such as a person's initials or an unusual surname. "Refer to" would be equally unclear - would "intend to refer to" be better? Peter James (talk) 14:05, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

It is a bit ambiguous, isn't it? I suppose I would go with "usernames that intentionally refer to a company, group...", with an additional sentence stressing that editors must be certain that the name intentionally represents such an entity. The current word "unambiguous" was added for this reason after a lengthy discussion, so I think it's important that that principle remains in the policy. NTox · talk 04:13, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

That's better - with or without "unambiguously"? Peter James (talk) 08:29, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

On the other hand, replacing "consist of" with "refer to" seems to contradict the subsequent provision that you're OK if you call yourself "james at WhateverInc" rather than "WhateverInc". Victor Yus (talk) 09:22, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

That's already mentioned as an exception. The "however" sentence would have to be changed to something like "An exception is if the name is clearly intended to denote an individual person". The third point of the ISU section (which doesn't belong there as names such as these don't imply shared use) would then be unnecessary. Peter James (talk) 10:03, 23 June 2013 (UTC) Or that provision could be removed as misleading (see User talk:Sarahandrews.wf). Peter James (talk) 10:06, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

I agree with that proposed rearrangement (but I think the examples from the 3rd point of ISU should be retained, being moved to the section we're talking about). I don't think the provision is misleading - we had a discussion about it some time ago, and I think there was a fairly clear consensus in favor of keeping the rule as it is. The fact that some admins seem unaware of it (I won't say deliberately ignore it) is not a reason to get rid of it. Victor Yus (talk) 20:08, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Hi guys. I have previously noticed that most users that have a violation of username policy are often softblocked, meaning only their account is disabled, no autoblock, they can create an account, they can still email, and they can still edit their talk page. I'd like to make a new proposal as followed:

• Softer block now also comes along with account creation disabled, in addition to having autoblock disabled. This way, they can't engage in sockpuppetry.

Do people agree? Thanks for thoughts and comments. WT101 (Chat • Count) 22:34, 1 July 2013 (UTC)

I propose to add the following to UPOL/UNC:

• Certain disruptive and offensive usernames (for example those containing contentious material about living persons, or those that are clearly abusive towards any race, religion or social groups) may be renamed by bureaucrats to protect Wikipedia and the subjects involved from harm.

Views/suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks. Wifione ^Message 18:42, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

I suppose I would have no issue with that myself, but I would say that it is very rare that a bureacrat changes someone's name without something happening first, whether that is an RFCN discussion or, more often, some administrator blocking the account in question. NTox · talk 01:22, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

True. Putting it in the policy gives such rare occurrences a procedural definition. Wifione ^Message 03:28, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

... but someone might want to check this account's edits and username. Sorry if this is the wrong platform for this comment. Thanks, --Another Believer _(Talk) 22:36, 7 November 2013 (UTC)

Reported [4] EEng (talk) 00:07, 8 November 2013 (UTC)

So I noticed a few things in the archive about gibberish names but I wanted to clarify before I notify the user for possibly breaking the username policy. Does Wikipedia allow gibberish names? Thanks in advance. Jns4eva (talk) 03:06, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

In general, if it's made out of letters and numbers, and not confusingly similar to something else, gibberish usernames are allowed. Policy on characters difficult to type on most keyboards is still undecided. That said, gibberish usernames may indicate mechanically generated spam accounts, so they can be regarded as initially suspicious. See [5] for a classic case of this. --John Nagle (talk) 07:38, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the help and for the reference! I wasn't sure if this fell into the list of "distracting" usernames or not but for future reference I'll assume good faith until I notice a bad edit. Thanks again! Jns4eva (talk) 02:17, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Hi, just a question: Is a username that very clearly states a (valid) political affiliation which can be offensive to some, but not most, people (e.g. choosing Communist or CommunistSympathiser or Red(Name) or so as a username), accptable, as long as it does not violate any other part of this policy?

I would know that e.g. Hitlerfriend or so would definitely not be acceptable, and CommunistPartyof[insert country] would also not because it implies affiliation with this party, but would a "general" politically biased name be OK?--Eu-151 (talk) 14:55, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Reading the policy, I'd say that a username offensive to "some" differs from one "likely to offend other contributors" but may be considered disruptive; also, ...it should be a name which other users will be comfortable with and which does not interfere with the project. A controversial name may give a bad impression to other users, and avoiding this is in your own interest.. Since "Red" does not automatically imply communism, it would be okay but you might raise some eyebrows editing political articles. All the best, Miniapolis 15:37, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

There have been some confusing user names since full Unicode support was implemented. I suggest requiring that Wikipedia user names be required to meet the IDNA 2008 criteria for domain names[6], with the addition of single spaces. IDNA 2008 is a collection of technical rules designed to prevent the abuse of Unicode to create two strings that look the same but are different. Code is available to enforce these rules. Basically, this means you can't mix certain characters in the same name, you can't mix left-to-right and right-to-left scripts, and certain homoglyphs are prohibited. Any name that fails these tests is doing something really weird with Unicode, and is probably not typable from its visible form. --John Nagle (talk) 05:25, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

To be effective, this would have to be enforced in software, which means you need a bugzilla: request. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:20, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

We do already have MediaWiki:Titleblacklist, most of which applies to usernames. Maybe someone would be interested in comparing them. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 08:44, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

There are templates that may be used with an account name. I found that when I used one such template with an account name that began with "=", the template did not work correctly ("=" is commonly used to indicate the value of a parameter, 1=foo). I don't know how to search for all the accounts containing "=", but there are 268 accounts with an initial "=". —rybec 02:49, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

A shared account is forbidden; a {{Shared IP}} may receive a template encouraging continued editing. An old revision of the policy says the prohibition is "for reasons of attribution and accountability", yet in the example given, "Secretary of the XY Foundation", the changes could reasonably be attributed to the XY Foundation as the work of its employee. When someone edits from a shared IP address, it's likely to be impractical to discover the person's identity. When someone makes a pseudonymous account (such as mine) it's at best inconvenient. The policy seems counter to its formerly stated purpose, and currently has no stated purpose.

The editor from Creative Concrete Products, LLC (talk · contribs) wanted to disclose a conflict of interest, but got taken to a noticeboard after a single "getting started" edit; the lengthy discussion must have consumed a great deal of other contributors' time. Someone from Suburban Express also tried to disclose a COI but ran afoul of the policy, attracting blocks for editing as Suburban express (talk · contribs) and Suburban Express President (talk · contribs). Another example is Whiopower (talk · contribs), whose connection to Genesis Energy Limited is less apparent under the new username.

This part of the policy seems like it may be doing more harm than good. Am I missing something? —rybec 04:06, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

The solution is to encourage such users to change to a username of the form "Mark at WidgetsUSA" or "Jack Smith at the XY Foundation"; these are explicitly permitted (see WP:ISU), though not everyone knows it, and they make a clear, and desirable, declaration of interest while also making clear that this is an individual and not a shared account. If a colleague also wishes to edit, he can be "Bill at WidgetsUSA", maintaining individual responsibility for edits. They should of course also be invited to read WP:PSCOI.

If IP editing is allowed at all, it is impossible to forbid shared IP use. JohnCD (talk) 20:04, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

@JohnCD: Thanks for answering! We can't know when people share an account, either, unless they tell us, or unless someone looks at their edits with WP:Checkuser. It should be obvious that if one shares one's password with another person, and that person misbehaves, the account is in jeopardy. If the restriction on shared accounts were lifted, "I shared my password with the wrong person" should not be a valid reason for unblocking after such misbehaviour. —rybec 02:59, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

The block of the person from Suburban Express was not blocked "for editing as....."; it was for other more serious reasons. North8000 (talk) 03:15, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

At User:Suburban express it's currently still possible to see an extract from the block log which says

2013-10-25T20:21:36 Smartse (talk | contribs) blocked Suburban express (talk | contribs) (autoblock disabled) with an expiry time of indefinite ({{uw-ublock}})

meaning the only reason (at that time--two days before my original post) was the username. It's certainly true that that editor later (after my post) attracted an additional block for more serious reasons, and I'm not advocating that that block be overturned. The points I was trying to make were that certain parts of the username policy don't have obvious utility, that the policy is often enforced soon after someone makes an account, going against the principle of "don't bite the newbies," and that changing the policy could make it easier for contributors to disclose a conflict of interest. The later (mis)behaviour of the Suburban Express editor doesn't invalidate my comments about the username policy. —rybec 05:02, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

'Saurabh Kumar' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 183.82.18.139 (talk) 07:44, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Did you mean to post this at WP:UAA? Either way, it seems like a perfectly acceptable username to me, especially if it's operated by someone whose real name is Saurabh Kumar. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 10:01, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

At Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/User_names#BillMoyers someone had written, "You know, that section of the policy needs a minor re-write to allow for the possibility that the editor actually is 'the well-known person of that name'." With my change [7] the sentence didn't make the assumption that the editor is not the well-known person.

Well-rested found my wording awkward and less concise [8]. How about "unrelated" rather than "no relation"? —rybec 23:44, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Wow, lots of activity going on here. This is why Wikipedia is addictive. Give me a minute to reply to this properly. :) - Well-rested^Talk 23:56, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Ok, a proper reply. Firstly, I reverted your edit because simply because it didn't change the meaning of the paragraph while making it read awkwardly and less concisely. If you look at the diff, there really is no difference in meaning unless it's such a subtle difference that I missed it altogether.

With regards to the concern stated in the RFC that the section needs to allow well-known editors to actually use their real names, the section already does so. Note the words "[...] unless it is your real name. If you are using such a name [...]" (italics mine). This allows for the possibility that an editor edits under his own real name.

-Well-rested^Talk 00:07, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

The 2nd through 4th paragraphs do indeed provide instructions for a well-known person who wishes to edit using a real name (as I had mentioned at RFC/U). However, the sentence in the first paragraph which I tried to change admits of no such possibility. After carelessly reading just the first paragraph, I came to the same misunderstanding as the other editor. Since italics are now on the table, here are mine:

If you are using such a name because it is your real name, you should make clear on your userpage that you are not (or are not related to) the well-known person of that name.

I'd like to see it changed to something like

If you are using such a name because it is your real name, but are not (or are not related to) the well-known person of that name, you should state clearly on your userpage that you are unrelated.

or

If you have the same name as a well-known person, but are unrelated, you should say so clearly on your userpage.

—rybec 00:42, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Ah, I finally see where the ambiguity is coming from. I'm in favour of something like your second version, but it needs to be edited to reflect the case of such a well-known user actually using his real name (as opposed to editing under a made-up name).-Well-rested^Talk 01:01, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Maybe something like this?

If you have the same name as a well-known person to whom you are unrelated, and are using your real name, you should state clearly on your userpage that you are unrelated to the well-known person.

-Well-rested^Talk 01:05, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you, that does express the change in meaning I wanted. —rybec 01:39, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

what an ill-advised policy. i will write a script to report all usernames (as they are inappropriate and/or vulgar in at least 1 other language. (and yes, i'm joking about the script, not the policy). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.209.180.8 (talk) 13:53, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

I made a change to allow it [10]. We have User:Plato. If controversial, please revert and explain. —rybec 01:11, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm about to revert it. I think the change makes sense only if we're talking about the impersonation of dead people, simply because dead people do not edit on Wikipedia. However it gets controversial in other circumstances, for example when we talk about usernames suggesting a close relationship with a recently-dead person. Pending further discussion by the community (if any) I think it's best to revert it to the original. -Well-rested^Talk 23:40, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

just because your name is Friedrich Nietzsche does not mean you're an impersonator! having the same name and impersonating are two pairs of shoes! parents often choose first names inspired by famous people of the same family name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.209.180.8 (talk) 13:55, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

There are unspecified exceptions to this policy for usernames that are email addresses. e.g. Rejection of admin attention for username User:Rms125a@hotmail.com[11]. I am editing this article to reflect that there are exceptions. That way, editors will know to not report such usernames unless and until they are otherwise problematic. —Danorton (talk) 21:36, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

This is ancient history. The name was grandfathered in long ago per Alison; I have been editing since 2005. Quis separabit? 22:56, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Sure, so it seems. I have simply documented the practice so that it's reflected in the policy. —Danorton (talk) 23:09, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Why would User:Rms125a@hotmail.com be reported? He has almost 90,000 edits, has been editing for over eight years, and is known around Wikipedia. Epicgenius (talk) 18:34, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

A discussion with OTRS volunteers on a possible policy change Gigs (talk) 19:36, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Hello i want to share a special thing that how to choose a user name. I think the CAPCHA given while creating an account, is a good user name for choice. I have also done it. - Cod Swick! (Reply here) 09:28, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Ilikepiewhy?idk (talk) 02:25, 14 February 2014 (UTC)

I also like pie, particularly steak and kidney pie, but you need to let us know what edit you think needs making. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 05:10, 14 February 2014 (UTC)

What if one computer is used by 50 people and each one creates a new account. Is that allowed? Phone numbers are not human, either, because 5 or sometimes more people can have the same phone number; so as for fake pizza ordering and other illegal things, the main purpose is not to stop the number from calling the pizza company, it's to stop the person from doing so. --166.137.208.33 (talk) 19:45, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

Are celebrities allowed to register for Wikipedia? 166.137.191.31 (talk) 14:51, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

See the section called WP:REALNAME. Now, if someone registers by the name of a celebrity and pretends to be them, that's immediately blockable. ES&L 17:40, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm not asking about IMPERSONATING a celebrity. I'm asking if a REAL one can register for Wikipedia. For example: can Justin Bieber have his own Wikipedia account? 166.137.191.16 (talk) 03:08, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I've heard he already does - he just doesn't call it User:JustinBieber, and he doesn't edit any articles about himself. Anyone can have an account - I might even be a celebrity, and you don't know it. Celebrities don't go around telling people about their Wikipedia accounts DP 10:01, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Is there any rule against using a symbol, and no letters or numbers, just a picture of an object, as a name? If not, should that rule be added? Hard to respond to people, if everyone just had a symbol instead of a name. And what if two editors both chose two different smiley faces, or something else similar? Get confusing. Dream Focus 22:21, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

There's Wikipedia:Username_policy#Usernames_with_non-Latin_characters. —rybec 23:25, 25 February 2014 (UTC)

That, and the longer bit it links to, talks about using other alphabets. It doesn't say anything about a symbol. I saw someone using User:✄ as an alternate account, not sure anyone would need to post in two different accounts if neither were their real name, but whatever. Just seemed rather odd. But if we let other alphabets in, why not a picture of scissors, or anything else people want to use? Dream Focus 02:46, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

There was an RfC about this a few years ago [12]. Consensus was summarized as "use common sense"--so, if it's something relatively simple and short, it would generally be okay, but some long hodgepodge of indecipherable symbols would likely not. NTox · talk 03:00, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

A few years ago, using symbols was encouraged for people whose native language was a non-Latin one. Would you rather have an undecipherable squiggle that says who knows what, in some language you will never be able to read and never really be able to tell the difference between two similar usernames, or a "picture", like a pair of scissors, that you can understand and remember? WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:35, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

I appear to have accidentally created this account with SF not capitalized (I only want to use StarchildSF, not Starchildsf). What should I do with the second account that I don't want to use? Starchildsf (talk) 18:16, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Feel free to just abandon the account you don't want. There's no harm by its existence if it simply stays put. It's recommended that you write a brief note on both accounts' user pages stating the name of the other account, and that they are both yours, which it appears you have already done. There are some templates created for this purpose if you prefer. NTox · talk 21:30, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi. The legal team was requested at ANI recently to talk about attribution requirements and their intersection with role accounts. You can find their statement on the matter here: meta:Wikilegal/Attribution requirements and role accounts. For convenience, I'm also reproducing the text below.

I hope you will find this useful. This has also been reported at Wikipedia talk:Sock puppetry#Attribution requirements and role accounts. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 15:13, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

119.226.34.50 (talk) 11:04, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

Not done: as you have not requested a change.
If you want to suggest a change, please request this in the form "Please replace XXX with YYY" or "Please add ZZZ between PPP and QQQ".
Please also cite reliable sources to back up your request, without which no information should be added to any article. - Arjayay (talk) 11:28, 18 March 2014 (UTC)