On Mon, 3 Feb 2003, Daniel Mayer wrote:
It is a little weird, but we can easily adjust to it. If someone starts using that account to do naughty things, we will just ban the account. If someone keeps doing this, we'll have to deal with it when it comes up.
Historically speaking, we haven't had a lot of trouble with people trying to subvert the system.
--Jimbo
I don't think that it is a good idea to allow this because it becomes impossible to track who is doing what if multiple different people are using the same user name at the same time. I know this also happens due to cheap-ass ISPs who use proxies but it is relatively rare that two people from the same IP edit at the same time. They also don't have a real choice in the matter.
Being a logged-in user has many benefits - but it also has added accountability. This is subverted by having a full-featured 'guest account.'
I don't have much objections to it. The only thing I see is that other people might make it seem that their changes were those of someone else. The 'special rights' of being logged in can be got easily by subscribing oneself.
I have myself used the empty string as my password in the past; I changed it to a 'real' password when I got admin rights.
Andre Engels