On 11/14/02 4:11 PM, "Brion Vibber" brion@pobox.com wrote:
On Thu, 2002-11-14 at 10:40, Jimmy Wales wrote:
The Cunctator wrote:
As you can see at http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/TMC%27s_sysop_request I basically agree, but I'll ask you to consider a more scalable resolution; that is, have the Recent Changes etc. display the nickname only, and enforce innocuousness of the nickname.
Is the nickname actually in the database? (Forgive my cluelessness on this point.) Or is the nickname just whatever someone happens to write?
An optional nickname can be set in the user preferences (so it's stored in the chunk o' options in the user table, but not in a conveniently accessible fashion). Its sole purpose is to appear as the text of a user page link in ~~~-signings in talk pages.
Showing the nickname *everywhere* would make the independent existence of the username both pointless and confusing.
That's its sole current purpose, but why should the nickname only appearing on talk pages be any less confusing?
The tagging of RecentChanges and revision edits with the username can be seen as equivalent to signing comments on the userpages. I don't think it's inherently confusing.
The majority of people don't use a nickname, so this change wouldn't even be an issue for the majority of the people.
I'm not saying this is a perfect idea; I just don't think its consequences would be mass confusion, and it certainly wouldn't be pointless.
Why not? Because we can't perfectly adjudicate the inoffensiveness of usernames. People have even thought that my username is vulgar.
The downside, as I see it, is more one of added complexity, and possibly just shunting off an issue that will come back later. But I'm not going to panic about unpredictable future possibilities.