Wikipedia talk:User account policy/Archive 1

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"Your username is not a forum to tweak other people's tails." - I quite like this bit and don't think it should be removed. Why? Because it anticipates and addresses a behavioural issue about what (I believe) people are doing when they choose "outrageous" user names. Maybe this sentence will cut down the amount of arguing about free expression and stuff, as I think it actually cuts rather neatly to the real underlying issue, which is "how much can I get away with?". Thanks to the user who produced this draft. 138.37.188.109 14:19 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

It might do to consider examples of what is or is not "too offensive". Here are some examples of potentially offensive usernames I have encountered elsewhere (some may be paraphrases):

  • JesusIsLord
  • Farrakhan
  • Satan
  • Czolgosz
  • WhiteMan
  • Fuck
  • ahitler
  • YouAllSuck
  • godhatesfags
  • Raper
  • HereticBoy
  • christ-on-a-stick
  • penis
  • Dr. Retard

Obviously, some of these are more offensive to certain sensibilities than others. I couldn't care less that someone wants to call himself "Fuck", but I would be a little concerned about participating in a collaborative project with someone called "YouAllSuck" or "Raper". (And "WhiteMan"? That was a guy named Whiteman who thought it was funny.) --FOo

I suppose I would be a little concerned about a user who wanted to call themself "Fuck", if only because of its potential effect in putting off other users. It makes the issue, again, be "what can I get away with" not "how can I easily identify myself". It's not like I'm actually that deeply shocked by it myself, it's just that it gives out the wrong message: if you are not hip enough to tolerate my cool user name, we don't want you here. 138.37.188.109 17:16 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

I'm in favour of this policy. I do wonder, however, what would happen if someone had a real name which was unfortunately similar to an English rude word. (eg Thomas Crapper....) -- Tarquin 16:56 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

Well, Raper is a real surname, although I doubt that's what the above user was alluding to -- taras 17:04 Jan 13 2003

I suggest the Crappers and the Rapers are just going to have to suck it up and use another name. They're probably used to the problem before they get here. Ortolan88
Heheh. Well presumably they could make a good case out for using it, though maybe if they got fed up with that they could just stick to Thomas. But in fairness, most of the problems you see with things like this are not the product of this sort of coincidence ... unless TMC really was called that in real life ... ?? :) 138.37.188.109 17:16 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
I tend to agree -- if only because the Recent Changes list puts people's names out of context. -- Tarquin 17:16 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
As Ambrose Bierce said, "Satire that is understood by the authorities is rightly prohibited." Who knows what Tarquin means? If it is subtle enough to slip through, cool, if it offends everybody, no go. After all, there may be some provincial Frenchie offended by Ortolan88
I was thinking of the foreign products which cause endless mirth on late night UK tv chat shows, eg biscuits called "crapp" or toilet paper called "pooe". The same phenomenon is bound to happen with people's surnames. -- Tarquin 17:29 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC) (although, yes, since there's a famous Roman Tarquin who was responsible for a grizzly rape... my username is NOT meant to be ANY reference to that.)
not forgetting Pschitt! the famous French lemonade (no kidding). I think the Bierce quote above gets it right - if it's obscure/subtle enough to not offend the notional target grandmother whose contributions we don't want to lose, then maybe it's not a problem. The ones that have been a problem (TMC, CG) are not quite at that level of subtlety! :) 138.37.188.109 17:44 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

The Bierce view is probably right, names that don't have an 'in joke quality' are probably less useful to the genuine activist than those anyone can 'get'.

But, there is an article in the meta on 'freedom to choose usernames' and it is probably better for the whole issue to be discussed there, or discussed here.

Non-obvious metaphor that states what it is, baldly, ought to be allowed, though, even if it makes use of the offensive words as defined in the above. Here are some examples of names that make bona fide political comments:

  • TaxIsTheft
  • GolfIsRape
  • FuckWar
  • EatHumans
  • StealDontBuy
  • GrowMoreHemp
  • ItthNotAWarItthAFethtival
  • BushLies
  • SpankCondoleeza
  • GushBore

I think I have seen all of these used as usernames. Chances are, there are one or more of those that you, the reader, simply do not understand as political and simply find offensive in some way. But, I assure you, there are many who do prescribe legitimately to these ideological statements, and they should be allowed to advertise their points of view in their usernames, if only to make it easier for us to spot bias.

sorry but I don't buy that at all - the purpose of the username is just a tag to ID a user, not a place for a statement to be made. OK, if a statement can be made without causing offence then fine, who's going to worry, but if it is offensive then we are back to the question of who benefits and who loses, and defending notional and rather vague "freedoms" at the price of losing actual, real, users and causing a narrowing of the user base. If people want to use their username to make a point then maybe they are in the wrong place - their username exists to facilitate the process of collaboratively building an encyclopedia, not for them to play clever games with their identity. Why is the freedom to offend so important that it overrides the purpose of the wikipedia? 138.37.188.109 18:00 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
I just added: "Fairly or unfairly, the line between acceptable and unacceptable usernames is drawn by the people who are offended, not by the creator of the name." Ortolan88
With exception, of course. I couldn't just say that "88" is a number which gives me the heebie-jeebies and you should change your name. But I guess that goes without saying. DanKeshet
Yeah, I explained why I chose it on my page, but I came across that "HH" bit later. I just hope it is obscure enough not to offend. If I find that it does offend people, I'll drop it, Tom Parmenter.

The lengthy justifications just added by 142.177.7.216 however well-intended, undercut the idea of a policy, which is "don't do it", by suggesting that there should be a lot of discussion and debate. I think a succinct policy with no philosophizing is preferable. My take, YMMV, Ortolan88

ditto, strongly. DanKeshet
I agree. The big addition is good and interesting stuff and should be kept, but not in the meta-article, which was in many ways better shorter. The last edit just tipped it over the edge into too-long-for-a-policy-summary, sorry. 138.37.188.109 18:49 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
you three should read consensus and consensus decision making and ethics and ask yourselves: how could such a policy be enforced without becoming a means of suppressing unpopular views? as it stands there are some things clearly wrong with the 'anything deemed offensive by anyone IS offensive' view, for instance, if someone named SchmuelLipschitz uses his own name as his userid and I find it offensive because it seems to make fun of Jews, am I entitled to force him to change his name? The problem with your absolutism is that you just don't see the many many ways it can be abused.
I really hate being accused of absolutism over something which started as a simple question and is now being a somewhat lengthy debate. It reminds me of student unions, not in a positive way (oh whoops now that's offensive. We are now off into massive debate about ethics and Jewish names and goodness knows what. This started with a user called Cumguzzler, did you know that? Do you really think there's a big problem with making that username non-OK?
nope, no problem at all, and the proposed process would make it non-OK in a jiffy - I truly doubt that name would find a lot of defenders even among militantly gay militia or pro-porn militia. But, it might, for instance someone might defend it on the grounds that it challenges homophobia or takes pride in fellatio skill or promotes safe sex even. That defense might find no one of reputation willing to defend it, but it should be heard and recorded. If you want a stricter process than I propose, propose your own.
Is that a freedom we want to really really put lots of effort an ddebate and typing time into defending when what we are supposed to be doing is building an encyclopedia. Now we're off into theory. I despair sometimes. 138.37.188.109 19:05 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
the metaphor of 'building' an encyclopedia is offensive to me, i prefer ot think of what we're doing as 'growing' it.
and there with that one simple statement we have a perfect illustration of why sane people should not get drawn into these debates - a nitpicking subedit about one offhand metaphor. A troll, perchance? So let me just say that I think the single quote marks around "building" are really upsetting and your spelling of "ot" is disrespectful and infringes my personal freedom to enjoy good spelling, oh and the four indents are, like, really inappropriate ... blah blah blah , wah wah wah ... drone <head explodes> 138.37.188.109 08:06 Jan 15, 2003 (UTC)
there's now a specific and objective definition of a policy that can be easily and quickly enforced, and the 'rationale', all of it, is after the fact, so those who accept the policy can just read it and understand and apply it.
The purpose of the user name is identification, not self-expression, and I don't see there's any debate it at all.
that's an ideological statement, and clearly contrary to fact, as there HAVE been debates, there WILL be debates, and the only way to avoid them is to give the power to change usernames to someone like you. is that what you want?
Sure, why not? I'm a mature, well-informed individual, flexible, easy-going, loves dirty jokes, intelligent, committed to the Wikipedia, easily accessed through my user page which gives both my real name and my real (since 1990) e-mail address. I don't want the power, of course, but if a valued contributor (just one, with a username and mail-me access) says "I quit if that name stays", then the name should go, not the valued contributor. Would you want to give the power to offend every person who looks at the Recent Changes to an unknown who got here yesterday under the name Cumguzzler? This isn't a hypothetical situation. It has already happened and we banned the name and regained the contributor. We lost the person with the offensive name, but that pretty much shows where they were coming from, doesn't it? Ortolan88
And I'm a first-amendment absolutist. I'd rather have a serial number for wikipedia than go through any discussion with anyone, even the hypothetical Mr. Lipschitz, about a user name. Tom Parmenter, Ortolan88 PS - Interesting that it is people without user names (see above, below, and on the page) doing all the proposing and approving of the verbose policy. Ortolan88
a choice to have NO user name and appear as an IP number is also a choice, and a legitimate one, that very many users currently take. but I'm not going into the anonymity debate here.
with regard to Ortolan88's comments on anon users, that's not actually correct - I know it is difficult to follow the edits, but 138.37.188.109 is NOT "doing all the proposing and approving of the verbose policy". See for example the one above which beings "I agree. The big addition ...". A minor point but it leads you to some kind of conclusion which in this one case at least is just not correct. And yes, there can be good reasons for anonymity, and as long as the facility remains available, I like being able to use it when I choose. 194.117.133.118 21:27 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
I didn't say it was all one person. It was several, one above, one below, another on the main page. I would add that while I have no objection to anonymous users, who are welcome and who make many a fine contribution each and every day, I don't know that they have much standing in a discussion of offensive user names. No anonymous user can possibly offend in that way, for one thing. I still don't like the longer version of the rule, which has the flaw of opening the door to debate, since I believe that the person who has chosen an offensive name will also welcome the debate, being, probably, trolls for whom the whole idea is energy vampirism. Ortolan88
good edit imho 138.37.188.109 19:00 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)
"The purpose of the user name is identification, not self-expression, and I don't see there's any debate it at all." -- indeed. especially as a user is free to write about their views on their user page. -- Tarquin 20:07 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

"There are few phrases that say anything at all that are not offensive to someone, and there are sometimes legitimate reasons for users to pick a particular name, e.g. someone who found the wikipedia to have a particular bias might pick a user name reflecting the opposite bias, to alert others to the problem and highlight their edits as the solution to it. Such use of usernames is not popular, but it is nonetheless one of the many ways identity is used in wikis."

This bit should go. I don't regard this as acceptable behaviour here. This might mean that, for instance, user:GayCommunist (to pick a real example) might one day be asked to change their username, but I think I'd be prepared to wear that to be able to change things like "AynRandShagsGoats" without somebody defending it as an attempt to make a political point. --Robert Merkel 23:07 Jan 13, 2003 (UTC)

Resubmitted for your consideration, the succinct form, added at the end of the verbose form. No "militia", no "like all questions of ethics", no loopholes, just a reasonable policy, stated clearly. Ortolan88

I would prefer the policy not be changed to avoid offensive usernames because it sounds prescriptive but not absolute. e.g. I could say "avoid split infinitives" and you could say "But I like to frequently split infinitives" and ... then what? "Please don't?" No, it should IMHO be 1) absolute and 2) clear: do not use offensive usernames. Just my 2c, maybe less. KQ

Wikipeida policy currently works by having a few very broad "generally accepted policies", which are based around broad, commonsense principles (e.g. 'respect other contributors' and 'neutral point of view), and lots of other suggested policies, which are in no way official but are nonetheless useful to give users hints as to how best to cooperate with other Wikipedians.

I believe that this system of a few broad, principle based rules is correct. If we try to make a rule for every detail of how we use wikipedia (exactly what username you can pick, exactly what words you can use to criticise someone before it is deemed offensive, exactly how you should go about writing an article, etc.) we would end up with not five or ten policies, but hundreds. The idea of having a rule for everything works great for lawyers and tax accountants, but it couldn't work for Wikipedia without lots of unproductive argument over each and every detail.

Not having offensive usernames is already broadly covered by our 'respect other contributors/ettiquette' policy, which should already convey to people that Wikipedia is not the place to come and be offensive to people. Anyone who can't grasp the sentence 'treat other contributors with respect' probably won't have much time for a 500 word policy on what their username should be either.

In summary, what we need here isn't a new rule or set of rules on exacly what usernames are allowed and what are not. Some broad, commonsense, non-official guidelines, in just a few sentences, should be more than enough.

Enchanter 02:53 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, those are good points except that Jimbo has already stated that the policy is effectively absolute, so the options seem to be 1) appeal to Jimbo, 2) leave wikipedia, or 3) bang your head against the nearest wall. Then there's always 4) live with it and 5) change the policy's title to reflect what the policy actually is, i.e. absolute. --KQ 03:15 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)
I've got no real disagreement with you there KQ. I'm happy that it's an absolute policy, and I'm happy for the title to reflect that, as in (5). The policy pages can be updated to say 'don't choose offensive usernames' in a single sentence (perhaps in Wikipedia:Wikipetiquette), and this page can serve as some more informal guidance as to how that policy is interpreted.
What I would be against is having a big, long, detailed set of "official rules" on exactly what usernames are and are not allowed. The rule is better summarised just by saying "Don't use offensive usernames", and applying some common sense. In summary I suggest the rule itself is official and final; the rest of the page is informal guidelines on how the rule is applied.
Enchanter 03:37 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)
Yes, I'd prefer not to have a long list of offensive usernames just because someone will find one we left off and then go about trolling smugly. But if we incorporate this policy into wikipetiquette, then part of wikipetiquette is absolute and the rest is not, which confuses the matter considerably and probably leads in the opposite direction you want. I think the result would be that people assume that since part wikipetiquette is absolute then all of it is absolute, and if violators of part of it can be banned, then violators of any other part of it can be banned. Then people will propose to ban people just for being rude, and if that ever happened then probably all of the top 100 contributors would be banned for some past violation. Maybe a separate policy is better? KQ
Thanks for your feedback KQ. I've cross referenced this policy page on Wikipedia:Wikipetiquette with an intro that is designed to make it clear that it is 'policy' rather than 'guidelines' (I also included the no personal attacks rule, which has Jimbo's specific backing rather like this one). Please take a look to check that the changes address your concerns. Enchanter 01:34 Jan 15, 2003 (UTC).
Looks fine, thanks.  :-) KQ

I much prefer the succinct version. --Robert Merkel 03:09 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

I VERY VERY much prefer the succinct version. The other stuff's interesting, put it somewhere else or on the Talk page or something. But when people look at the article for what the rules are, just tell them, briefly. No discussion, it just muddies the waters. 138.37.188.109 08:50 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

I prefer the succinct version too. The long version could be moved to meta, right? Martin 14:30 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

I don't care what name somebody uses. I urge you all to just not care about trite nonsense. Vera Cruz

Then, oh god, you are missing the point so badly that it beggars belief. I would try to explain it to you but (a) I can't be bothered and (b) I can't believe that you are actually that stupid, which means you must be trolling, which means I still can't be bothered. And since the policy has been clearly stated and restated, your "urgings" are irrelevant and may safely be ignored. Bye now. 138.37.188.109 09:12 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

Thank you for your opinons, they are highly valued. Vera Cruz

Children, children. Keep on-topic, please. Vera, I think what Mr 138 was trying to say was that it doesn't matter if you, personally, are not offended by particular usernames, or that people shouldn't get worked up about such things. What *does* matter is that people shouldn't be prevented from working on Wikipedia by being confronted with other people's usernames which they consider offensive. All a username is for is to provide a unique identifier. That's all. If it interferes with anything else, it should be changed. --Robert Merkel 09:29 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

I do not believe names should be restricted in any sense. I have no sympathy for somebody who finds a name to be offensive. I do not think any actions should be taken in regards to usernames. Vera Cruz

This is a discussion of how to present the existing policy, which won't be changed, because it is the policy of the owner of the server. Ortolan88

well then let him worry about-why waste time arguing about it. Vera Cruz


Could we please have the older form of the policy, currently at the foot of the main page? What is on top of the page as it currently stands is dreadful. Not only is it badly written, I could swear I heard jackboots as I read it. This policy does NOT need lines of verbiage. All we really need is "please use common sense when choosing a username." -- Tarquin 17:15 Jan 14, 2003 (UTC)

As a result of these votes, the long version has been moved here. Please berate me heavily if there's a problem with this. Martin