On Sun, Apr 5, 2009 at 8:35 AM, Aryeh Gregor Simetrical+wikilist@gmail.com wrote:
There's still the "Why can't I log in anymore?" problem. Sysops can currently block people, but at least they're told that they blocked, who blocked them, and why.
Yeah that would arise when somebody has been renamed without requesting it, but as far as I know all involuntarily renamed users except for Trollderella have been indef-blocked vandal accounts (who would have little to gain by still being able to log in, and whom we wouldn't be particularly interested in helping). The one exceptional case was part of the reason Uncle Ed was pressured to resign as bureaucrat.
My point is this isn't something that happens very often now and I doubt lowering the user-group requirement would make it happen much more often. Either way it would be easy enough to revert and probably still be considered grounds for summarily removing access.
In any case it might be helpful to provide a certain grace period during which the old name still works on the login screen as a valid alias, or possibly indefinitely unless there is a reason to for another user to claim the old name (in cases of deliberate impersonation or coincidental SUL conflicts, etc.)
—C.W.