Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name • Hacker News Board

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#61

Post by ubernostrum » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 6:15 AM UTC

franciscop wrote: post #55

mdadm wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Names: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-... 32. People’s names are assigned at birth. 33. OK, maybe not at birth, but at least pretty close to birth. 34. Alright, alright, within a year or so of birth. 35. Five years? 36. You’re kidding me, right? I must know what case there is of this, and who exactly was the poor soul to stumble upon it...

As far as I know, in the US when you get married (most?) women get the husband's last name. And it might change if they divorce/marry again.

It's not automatic a lot of places, these days. It's just a far simpler/faster process to get the name change done, and most companies and even government agencies won't raise a fuss over a woman filling out a last name that doesn't match her ID, because they'll assume she got married and took her husband's name.

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#62

Post by bzbarsky » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 6:17 AM UTC

mdadm wrote: post #47

wlesieutre wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Names: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-... Time: http://infiniteundo.com/post/25326999628/falsehoods-programm... Addresses: https://www.mjt.me.uk/posts/falsehoods-programmers-believe-a... Geography: http://wiesmann.codiferes.net/wordpress/?p=15187&lang=en

> Names: https://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-... 32. People’s names are assigned at birth. 33. OK, maybe not at birth, but at least pretty close to birth. 34. Alright, alright, within a year or so of birth. 35. Five years? 36. You’re kidding me, right? I must know what case there is of this, and who exactly was the poor soul to stumble upon it...

There are cultures at which a coming of age ceremony involves assignment of a name, either in addition to existing ones or replacing them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtesy_name and http://www.samurai-archives.com/names.html and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation#Confirmation_name are some examples.

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#63

Post by Sevrene » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 6:33 AM UTC

Stilgherrian[1], a technology journalist and commentator from Australia has had issues with this, particularly the Google Plus name policy. He changed his name to his online handle because that's simply what everyone called him.

If I'm designing regular expression to parse a phone number, I make sure that it works on ALL valid phone numbers for the regions required. The same should be done for name policies that are used worldwide, to me it's actually insane and such a huge drawback; banning or blocking users because their name is abnormal yet valid, in the quest of what, removing trolling?

1. https://stilgherrian.com/category/only-one-name/

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#64

Post by cloudjacker » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 6:34 AM UTC

Senji wrote: post #60

pix64 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution is to choose a "normal" pseudonym.

Choose a Jewish name for added shenanigans.

Yeah I usually opt for some minority subculture to get past this stuff - ie facebook wouldnt interfere with the adjective middle name meme if you were black - or if that doesn't work I then guilt trip tech companies into being aware of minority group naming patterns, or if that doesnt work I tell them Ill call (or actually contact) washington post to give them the monthly reminder about how little perspective they get from other ethnic groups

Its pretty successful

But you can also just order fake ids on darknet for web site verifications

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#65

Post by emsy » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 6:51 AM UTC

It baffles me that Quora is so successful despite their closed approach. You can't use a pseudonym and can't see questions unless you login (there are workarounds, but I'm talking about normal users). They also seemingly block archive.org from archiving their content. Stack Exchange on the other hand has none of these drawbacks.

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#66

Post by 5555624 » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 7:00 AM UTC

parennoob wrote: post #50

stormy wrote: post #15

Unless their policy has changed, it's a temporary restriction of the account until the user helps work with a mod to verify the name. Happened to me way back in 2010, because my real name sounds terribly fake: Stormy Shippy

I don't know about Quora's "work with a mod to verify the name" policy works, but I have heard from at least one friend that Facebook makes you give them a scan your driving license or other Government ID in order to show that your slightly unusual name is actually what you say it is. Which is just absurd. A random social network should never be so powerful as to demand your Government-issued IDs for some bogus "real…

In the US, As long as "other Government ID" is not an actual Government ID. Scanning/photocopying is a violation of Title 18, US Code Part I, Chapter 33, Section 701. While there evidently are exceptions for government agencies performing official business, Facebook is not a government agency.

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#67

Post by innocentoldguy » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 7:00 AM UTC

Quora sucks. Well, I guess it is OK, if you like a sterile community, where contrary opinions and rational thought are smoothed and sanitized for easy and spineless consumption.

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#68

Post by simcop2387 » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 7:03 AM UTC

dawnerd wrote: post #9

protomyth wrote: post #5

I should get a couple of people from around here (Native American reservation) to sign up and see how messy their policy is. If you cannot validate names, then you probably should not use a real name policy. It bad enough Facebook (and I guess Quora) causes people pain, don't add your own wounds.

Facebook's policy is so weird. I have a ton of older test accounts that literally include TEST and other such very obvious fake text in the name.

I got upset when they went through and deleted all locations that weren't mappable. I used to have my location as one in the moon for fun, then they deleted that and wouldn't let me set one unless the address was available in their geolocation service

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#69

Post by manojlds » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 7:15 AM UTC

emsy wrote: post #65

It baffles me that Quora is so successful despite their closed approach. You can't use a pseudonym and can't see questions unless you login (there are workarounds, but I'm talking about normal users). They also seemingly block archive.org from archiving their content. Stack Exchange on the other hand has none of these drawbacks.

You cannot compare Quora and Stack Exchange. Quora thrives on stupid questions that really don't have a well defined answer.

Re: Quora has blocked me because it doesn't think Theodore Ts'o is my real name

#70

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Oct 08, 2016, 7:16 AM UTC

emsy wrote: post #65

It baffles me that Quora is so successful despite their closed approach. You can't use a pseudonym and can't see questions unless you login (there are workarounds, but I'm talking about normal users). They also seemingly block archive.org from archiving their content. Stack Exchange on the other hand has none of these drawbacks.

[deleted]