Xeno

You will receive a faster response if you post to my en.wiki talk page; however, if I've recently sought your advice via your local talk page, feel free to reply here.

Soft redirect
This page can be found at w:en:User talk:Xeno.

renaming users

Hi Xeno, I have been waiting for an answer to a question about renamed users since 3 January 2021. Can you spare the time to answer. Thanks in advance, Ottawahitech (talk) 02:44, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

BTW I forgot to explain that I cannot post my question at enwiki. Ottawahitech (talk) 02:47, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Thankfully the software has come along considerably since I left these soft redirects. –xeno (talk) 03:56, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Hello Ottawahitech, could you clarify your question? Renaming users doesn't create an additional account, it moves all contributions to the new name. –xeno (talk) 02:50, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the speedy reply and for pinging me. The reason I ask is the discussion we are having at Wikiquote:Administrators' noticeboard#What is a sock?. Thanks again, Ottawahitech (talk) 02:57, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Ottawahitech: I scanned that discussion briefly but I'm afraid I don't see a connection to globally renaming users. Can you clarify? –xeno (talk) 03:00, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

I was wondering about the statement made by User:BD2412:

The whole point of having an account is to connect responsibility for edits with the specific editor.

If the UserID is changed to a different ID how can others connect the new userID with old edits and vice verse? Ottawahitech (talk) 03:19, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Username changes, unlike sockpuppetry, generate a public record of the username change. Because the entire edit history of the editor moves to their new name, any editor can see what they have done over the course of their time editing. BD2412 T 03:30, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Yes, the previous edits are attributed to the new name, the rename is logged, and one can find the new name of a previous username via the rename logs. I'm not sure if there's an easy way via the logs to find the old name of a user, one has to look at history of the user or user talk pages, or in past contribution or article histories for a reference to the old name. Keep in mind the meta:Global rename policy prohibits renames where The user is ... seeking the rename to conceal or obfuscate bad conduct. Hope that helps (and thanks BD2412, good to see you!). –xeno (talk) 03:56, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Thank you both for your answers.

One of the reasons I am interested in renames has to do with my own ancient wiki-history which to this day I am perplexed by. Back in 2012 I was given an ultimatum: "change your user name or else we'll block you"

I checked the link to the rename policy provided by xeno above and discovered this:

The user is not seeking the rename to conceal or obfuscate bad conduct.

and since I was told at the time that my username was not allowed on enwiki (translation:bad conduct) and that I must change it or else be blocked, I wonder what would have happened today if I had complied. Would I not be in contravention of this policy?

Thanks for your thoughts, Ottawahitech (talk) 16:52, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Ottawahitech: The short answer is “context matters”. The intent of your rename would have been to change from a username purportedly in violation to one that was compliant. The old username would have been duly and visibly linked to the new username, and your talk page would have had a record of the transaction (so bad conduct was not concealed or obfuscated; or, to the extent that it would be, wouldn’t be the motivation behind the rename - indeed you could have said you were compelled).

A violation of that section of the global rename policy might look something like: User:Y causes a bunch of disruption, gets taken to notice boards for potential sanctions and seeks a rename to User:Z in order to make it difficult for editors to recognize their future edits (and potential continuing disruption) as from the same individual. –xeno (talk) 17:27, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

While I was revisiting old enwiki, I also came across w:Category:Wikipedians with alternative accounts which, I think, really allows (some?) users the use of "legal" sock accounts. I personally do not object to allowing users to "sock". I have always believed that some oldtimers could benefit from seeing the wiki-world from the eyes of pretend-newbies. However, since socking appears to be such a grave contravention of wiki-laws, why are some people allowed the sock? Cheers, Ottawahitech (talk) 15:40, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

There are legitimate uses of alternate accounts on enwiki, so most users are permitted to create and use alternate accounts for security, privacy, designated roles or purposes, etc. I found the alternate policy of this project here: Wikiquote:Username policy#Using multiple user accounts which currently says "It is recommended that users not edit under multiple usernames, unless they have a very good reason." I can think of a good reason on this project: if one wanted to add quotes from sources they do not wish to connect to their primary Wikimedia account. –xeno (talk) 16:17, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Hi Xeno, I've read your name in the Bureaucrats list in Wikipedia so I thought I could ask you some information that maybe the English admins might not be able to give me:

1. Is there a "UTRS" and an "ArbCom" also on Wikiquote (and other projects) or the ones in Wikipedia are valid also in Wikiquote (etc)?

1. Is there a sort of list of a admins who deal with the requests to UTRS/ArbCom (or maybe something like a template in their user pages instead) or, on the contrary, is there no way to know which admins deal with them?

I hope that there's no problems with my question and that you can help me with such information, thanks in advance if you will :-)

Hi 151.x, sorry for the late reply.

1. To my knowledge there is no arbcom on Wikiquote as of now. The English Wikipedia ArbCom wouldn't accept a case considering issues from wikiquote, and certainly not without some wikiquote project consensus that they have the ability to do so. There is no 'Global arbitration committee' as of now.
2. For wikiquote questions, I can see that enwp colleagues GreenMeansGo and BD2412 are sysops listed as active bureaucrats here and probably could answer best. –xeno (talk) 23:51, 6 June 2022 (UTC)