[WikiEN-l] User names

J. Noel Chiappa jnc at lcs.mit.edu
Sun Oct 12 12:57:43 UTC 2003


     > From: Matthew Woodcraft <mattheww at chiark.greenend.org.uk>

     > Daniel Mayer wrote:

     >> Where did I say that they should be banned? Changing a user name does
     >> not ban the user. Think of it as a dress code; the great majority of
     >> employers do not allow their employees to wear shirts expressing
     >> controversial opinions.

     > I think this is a good analogy.
     > And, as Wikipedia is not our employer, I think imposing a dress code is
     > inappropriate.

OK, I'll bite.

So how would Wiki contributors who are born-again Christians (or other
equally fervent varieties) feel about the hypothetical username
"ThereIsNoG-dButAllah"? (One of the main tenets of Islam, dontchankow.)

(For those who don't know, the "-" is for Orthodox Jews, who do not like to
see the name of the deity written out in full.)

I mean, they are really perfect mirrors - TINGBA asserts that all other
beliefs are false, and JiL also basically makes the same statement.

I really like Mav's analogy - and please note that the dress code he speaks
of wasn't about collars, it was about "expressing controversial opinions".

	Noel




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