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Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

blog.stevepoland.com

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Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#21

Post by diN0bot »

johns wrote: post #17
dsims wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if they allowed duplicate names? Navigating to twitter.com/username would then display everyone with that name (like how Wikipedia handles it). The chances that you are following more than one person with the same name is pretty slim. If that does happen, then you pick which one gets your @ replies.

I wouldn't want my competitors sharing a username with me.

that's a good point, but i bet that could be resolved, too. i like the show_all option. the more transparency the better. we still want to be careful not to squander the resources of clarity and lack of information.

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#22

Post by Retric »

rokhayakebe wrote: post #14
geuis wrote: post #2

So someone is complaining that they registered a bunch of names they thought would be monetarily valuable at a later date, and is complaining when the company that provides the service is disallowing him from doing it? Sorry, but that just earns a big f*ck you from me. I have no sorrow for domain squatters, and that extends to people who grabbed Facebook app names, Twitter names, whatever. Twitter isn't like the DNS…

First of, you could have skipped the insults. Apparently you do not know much about Steve. I recommend you go read some of his 70+ ideas he posted almost 2 years back. Secondly, he saw an opportunity when most people did not, so he should totally benefit from it. 18 months ago, most people did not know about Twitter and they could not see it being useful to anyone. Steve did. You should go back to his blog entries at…

That's just it there was no opportunity and Twitter is better off preventing people from trying exploit others by being the first to grab interesting names.

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#23

Post by subpixel »

I disagree - I don’t think Twitter is going down a slippery slope. I think they’re making a sincere attempt to make their service as authentic and as useful as possible.

The subtext is that a Twitter username suggests identity (in fact that’s the underlying magic of Twitter) and that the service on the whole becomes less useful as identity becomes fractured.

It may well come to pass that they need to set up a more stringent system to analyze conflicts (e.g. what if your last name and user name were knicks and your twitter feed was not about basketball?).

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#26

Post by GHFigs »

In summary, he's saying they need a better policy (i.e. more clearly defined rules), so that he can game the system better. Classic webcockery.

Sorry, chap, but the Terms of Service do not state that Twitter will guarantee your business model, and you're an idiot for thinking that you "owned" the name in the first place.

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#27

Post by AndrewWarner »

axod wrote: post #12
AndrewWarner wrote: post #4

This issue isn't unique to Twitter. Anyone who's building a site today is going to have these issues. We need some clever solutions here.

Isn't it the same issue as last year, and the last 10 years? Picking usernames etc isn't a new practice.

My point is that it's an old problem in desperate search of a solution. We need a single name that works across all sites. Why should I have to tell people that I'm AndrewWarner on Hacker news and Twitter, but if they want to find me on digg on AndrewDiggs because AndrewWarner was already taken. And if the want to find me...

We need one public identifier that works across all networks.

What do you think?

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#28

Post by wmf »

AndrewWarner wrote: post #27
axod wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it the same issue as last year, and the last 10 years? Picking usernames etc isn't a new practice.

My point is that it's an old problem in desperate search of a solution. We need a single name that works across all sites. Why should I have to tell people that I'm AndrewWarner on Hacker news and Twitter, but if they want to find me on digg on AndrewDiggs because AndrewWarner was already taken. And if the want to find me... We need one public identifier that works across all networks. What do you think?

We need one public identifier that works across all networks.

OpenID?

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#29

Post by GHFigs »

imp wrote: post #9

The user name bostonceltics is taken by someone that is doing the same thing and using the Boston Celtics' logo for their icon. Seems like they would have been a better candidate to bully into moving their user name. http://twitter.com/bostonceltics

Why is that better? The author was using the logo for both the icon and the background, and under the name "Boston Celtics News", and perhaps most damningly, it wasn't a fan account by an actual human being, it was a fully automated bot account. One one dozens he runs. Or did run, before most of them were suspended.

See the list here, and see how many are still around: http://blog.stevepoland.com/first-twitter-bots-launched-spor...

Re: Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames

#30

Post by GHFigs »

rokhayakebe wrote: post #14
geuis wrote: post #2

So someone is complaining that they registered a bunch of names they thought would be monetarily valuable at a later date, and is complaining when the company that provides the service is disallowing him from doing it? Sorry, but that just earns a big f*ck you from me. I have no sorrow for domain squatters, and that extends to people who grabbed Facebook app names, Twitter names, whatever. Twitter isn't like the DNS…

First of, you could have skipped the insults. Apparently you do not know much about Steve. I recommend you go read some of his 70+ ideas he posted almost 2 years back. Secondly, he saw an opportunity when most people did not, so he should totally benefit from it. 18 months ago, most people did not know about Twitter and they could not see it being useful to anyone. Steve did. You should go back to his blog entries at…

In this case, it's quite clear that Steve saw an opportunity to make money where there wasn't one. His attempt to squat on these "quality" names that were "front row seats" was based on the ridiculous idea that a Twitter name is worth money. He was wrong.
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