Hello, i'm not /pd, i'm Ramibotros. But this forum has always allowed everyone to choose his identification .. isn't it time that someone abuses this? :) .. i think we should start working with accounts some day, although admitedly, i cannot think of why somebody would want to abuse this, except for fun purposes, i guess..

[Name changed. -Philipp]

Yes Ramibotros you are right, by the way i am sankar anand not Corsin Camichel.

and i tried using philip name i get this error
The name you provided belongs to someone else here.

[Named changed. -Philipp]

(Okay, I am Corsin)
Sankar, stop it or I have to delete the post :-)

:-) Corsin Cool-Down........

Duh!!!

Identity crisis looming ahead...

A system where you could register your nickname would be useful.

But it should be stupid to compel the (new) users to registred their nickname. You should be able to post here without have to sign up.

BTW, the previous message was from the real TOMHTML :-P

In the end, persons are not that important. Their ideas / words are.

I like TomHTML's idea of parking nicknames for registered users only, just like philipp lensenn has it. I think it's important because u dun want any random user to speak (eg. insult people) using ur identity.

yeah ramibotros has a good point....... there should be some way to register....

(I am NateDawg :)

You'll have to wait for philipp for this one, but I think that his policy is this. If you find your nickname being abused (and it's unique, not "John Smith") email him explaining what's going on. Philipp does have a method in place that can require usernames for nicknames, hence why you can't post as Philipp. Phillip will sometimes pre-emptively (sp?) lock down an account likey to be abused (ie Matt Cutts). I personally like the feel of no logins.

Yeah, but nobody would break something that is not supposed to be protected, because it would be stupid. But many people would love to break protections, just for a sake of it. So sometimes it's better to leave something unprotected...

On the other hand account would be nice for the other things, like customizable profiles and new messages notification.

Keep it simple.

(I am Sam Davyson)

I would not really be interested in having a login system. I don't think anyone really would want to pretend to be anyone else enough on this forum to forge usernames. Just everyone behave and we have no hassle and no worries.

I scale the security with the actual need for it as well as the dangerous implications of something going wrong. For example, as soon as we notice large scale abuse of nick names, then we need to fight it. And as soon as I would store your credit card numbers or such, then we would need to implement higher security. Until these things happens, the current system works fine.

Some names are protected but not because these persons are "VIPs", but simply because these persons are more likely to have their names be abused. Whenever I find something is fishy, I do background checks. I often did this for Matt Cutts, for example, though he now has a protected nickname. If you see something fishy, please drop me an email.

Another example of scaling security is using Captchas. Captchas fight spam but come at a price – lowered usability. So, in theory, you can argue that this forum can be abused by mass-spam sending (e.g. 500 spam comments in 5 minutes). However in practice, this is rarely a problem, and so far could always be quickly fixed. Until that changes, I won't add Captchas cause I like to keep it simple. Having to not register here is another form of keeping it simple.

If I catch someone changing their nickname (through background IP checks, which I often do), then I remove all of their past posts I can find. I did this in the past. Others help edit along here to improve quality and spot "fishy" things going on. Please do not change your nicknames even for testing purposes or for fun. This community relies on trust. It's a bit like a small town where everyone knows everyone, so no one locks their bikes. Please don't steal bikes :)

Yes, I would second Phlipps thoughts here.

Many of us have discussed this issue at length in the forum and also via emails and have weighed the pros and cons of having a users identity module or a log-in system.. But, AFIK- this was not vetoed and we continued to foster the *right* way of doings. Openness, transparency and trust are the 3 elements, that makes this forum unique. -There's no other forum like this, out there.

Trust me -I am a troll of the highest order and I believe that this space is unique. Do not violate the trust has been given to you. Trust and respect its does not come freely, each one of you have earned it --at least from me.

FWIW- Just because a person can speak freely, does not make them intelligent and just because a person is 'dumb' does not make him stupid. Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the *only* thing , that we have.

'nuff said

</rant end> :)-

but i think a "new post notifier" via mail will be nice....

stefan2904:

Even a 2.7GB+ gmail account would soon be bursting at the seems if you had all new posts emailed to you...

i don´t think so.

i abide by the rules /PD >>>>

regards
Sankar Anand

> but i think a "new post notifier" via mail will be nice....

I'd rather see notification via Jabber (this includes Google Talk and Gmail Chat) there are couple of good Jabber PHP libraries like class.jabber – http://cjphp.netflint.net/

Of course notofications would be turned off by default, and you would turn it on for the specific threads.

<<Even a 2.7GB+ gmail account would soon be bursting at the seems if you had all new posts emailed to you...>>

Well it depends whether it's, per message, per hour, per day, per week etc.

A best posts of the week email may be useful for someone who dosn't have time to read all the posts, or if I go away for a few weeks.

Yes I best posts of the week digest would be nice. But maybe this could just be compiled by Philipp (or automatically based on views and comment numbers) and posted to the frontpage of the blog. Then everyone could pick up the "weekly roundup" by RSS.

i think rss is good enough ..

>>And as soon as I would store your credit card numbers or such, then we would need to implement higher security.

Do I see a Blogoscoped Checkout service on the horizon? :)

Niraj, way to funny; hehe; lol :)-

Ditto post notifier as something that would be nice.

Mixed feelings on the requirements for logins – yea, would be nice, but then again, I agree with Philipp that one scales as needed (ideally staying ahead of the power curve), but tries to keep it simple. He may want to consider showing a "verified" flag (or something like that) for people like Matt Cutts.