Agreed, it should be possible to fully withdraw from the site without breaking all conversations one was involved in. People shouldn’t have to choose between leaving their username visible in some places and deleting all their comments.
Except that deleted accounts should all have different deleted-account usernames, so that if some unfortunate thread has two participants who later delete their accounts it doesn’t become completely impossible to make sense of the discussion.
What if it just kept the first three (or so) letters of the login name? The chances of two people with the same first three letters discussing the same thing is, while not infinitesimally low, well within acceptable limits. If you knew the person before deletion, it would let your recognize them, but it would keep their name from turning up in searches (the main reason, that I know of, for deleting accounts).
This. In fact you should still be able to login and edit, in case you put specific private info in a comment you want to delete. Just your display name should change to (Account deleted).
This. In fact you should still be able to login and edit, in case you put specific private info in a comment you want to delete. Just your display name should change to (Account deleted).
Your preferences in this thread appear incompatible with each other.
My vote was for disabling, but I think this should also change your username to something suitably anonymous (like “Account deleted”).
How about username-change as an option without also necessary disabling? Possibly with restrictions against abuse.
The necessary disabling is a restriction against abuse.
Yes, and a reasonably good one, but is it the best one?
Unless someone proposes a specific better one, I don’t want to let the best be the enemy of the good.
Agreed, it should be possible to fully withdraw from the site without breaking all conversations one was involved in. People shouldn’t have to choose between leaving their username visible in some places and deleting all their comments.
Except that deleted accounts should all have different deleted-account usernames, so that if some unfortunate thread has two participants who later delete their accounts it doesn’t become completely impossible to make sense of the discussion.
What if it just kept the first three (or so) letters of the login name? The chances of two people with the same first three letters discussing the same thing is, while not infinitesimally low, well within acceptable limits. If you knew the person before deletion, it would let your recognize them, but it would keep their name from turning up in searches (the main reason, that I know of, for deleting accounts).
There’s a nonzero number of people with three-letter usernames.
What’s more, Spencer was replying to one of them!
That is a very good idea.
This. In fact you should still be able to login and edit, in case you put specific private info in a comment you want to delete. Just your display name should change to (Account deleted).
Your preferences in this thread appear incompatible with each other.
Hm. True. Perhaps someone could request an unlock from a moderator. The way the interface is currently set up, I can’t edit other user’s comments.
You should probably be given the ability to modify deleted accounts posts.
Agreed.