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This seems like a bad idea - These types of unique usernames attract the wrong kind of crowd[0] (some have used harrasment up to physical violence to get vanity

This seems like a bad idea - These types of unique usernames attract the wrong kind of crowd[0] (some have used harrasment up to physical violence to get vanity usernames). I would prepare to see a lot more account hijacking and sketchy behaviour over Discord. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OGUsers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OGUsers

runnerup 3y ago
Completely agree. I loved Discord's unique and wonderful discriminator system for usernames. I imagine their current system would have worked if they had: 1) Only allowed ASCII characters without any case sensitivity 2) Required users to pick their own discriminator when they create an account, rather than having a default one automatically assigned to you (that you can change later) But I'm sure they looked at the difficulty of changing that and what it would mean to blow away everyone's current username and replace it with a mostly-identical looking system and decided that would be awful.
- mvdtnz 3y ago
  I feel like you're ignoring all of the downsides and problems with the username#discriminator system that are clearly laid out in the article. * Your solution doesn't solve the problem that nearly half of users don't know their discriminator or even know what that is * Busy usernames like Mike and Jane are still unavailable * They're still difficult and cumbersome to share offline (although slightly improved)
  - reaperman 3y ago
    It solves the awareness problem by making them choose it when they create their account. If you need more, you can have a fun little animation that presents the finalized username + discriminator after it's created. Or show them how to add Tom from Myspace. I figured the "busy usernames" issue was a truly trivial problem solved by making the discriminator a 0 to 5-digit alphanumeric. Because the discriminator would be chosen by the user, it would only be as cumbersome as sharing a normal username or email. What I felt discord really needed was a way to send an invite link to be friends.
- KomoD 3y ago
  > 2) Required users to pick their own discriminator when they create an account, rather than having a default one automatically assigned to you (that you can change later) Well... you can if you pay them money
seanhunter 3y ago
Unfortunately the existing discriminator system makes account impersonation incredibly easy on discord. You see a person on your server that looks like "Sean Hunter", they have the same profile pic etc but it's easy not to notice they are sean#3117 vs sean#3118 being the "real" Sean. There is a whole industry of people making bots etc to automatically detect and kick attempted impersonators precisely because this is such a problem.
- jsmith45 3y ago
  True, but the new system will only improve it a tiny bit. According to this post In most of the UI it will use your display name (or presumably your server nickname) which will be allowed to match other users. You can still have matching profile pics. To tell people apparat in the new system you need to click their profile and look at the username field, which only helps if the real user has a simpler username than the impersonator. Otherwise, like much like on Twitter, there is no good way for others to know which of @SeanHunter, @SeanHunterOfficial, @RealSeanHunter, is the real Sean Hunter and which ones are impersonators. The may all have identical display names, identical profile pictures, etc. So those anti impersonation systems will still be just as needed.
- hinata08 3y ago
  The transition is exactly the time for impersonation I hope they will protect some usernames that are shared by no other users (eg the name of artists) Malicious users could register the Twitter handle of popular artists, to impersonate them or to request a fee to have it back :/ I hope they thought that out.

runnerup 3y ago

Completely agree. I loved Discord's unique and wonderful discriminator system for usernames. I imagine their current system would have worked if they had: 1) Only allowed ASCII characters without any case sensitivity 2) Required users to pick their own discriminator when they create an account, rather than having a default one automatically assigned to you (that you can change later) But I'm sure they looked at the difficulty of changing that and what it would mean to blow away everyone's current username and replace it with a mostly-identical looking system and decided that would be awful.

mvdtnz 3y ago
I feel like you're ignoring all of the downsides and problems with the username#discriminator system that are clearly laid out in the article. * Your solution doesn't solve the problem that nearly half of users don't know their discriminator or even know what that is * Busy usernames like Mike and Jane are still unavailable * They're still difficult and cumbersome to share offline (although slightly improved)
- reaperman 3y ago
  It solves the awareness problem by making them choose it when they create their account. If you need more, you can have a fun little animation that presents the finalized username + discriminator after it's created. Or show them how to add Tom from Myspace. I figured the "busy usernames" issue was a truly trivial problem solved by making the discriminator a 0 to 5-digit alphanumeric. Because the discriminator would be chosen by the user, it would only be as cumbersome as sharing a normal username or email. What I felt discord really needed was a way to send an invite link to be friends.
KomoD 3y ago
> 2) Required users to pick their own discriminator when they create an account, rather than having a default one automatically assigned to you (that you can change later) Well... you can if you pay them money

seanhunter 3y ago

Unfortunately the existing discriminator system makes account impersonation incredibly easy on discord. You see a person on your server that looks like "Sean Hunter", they have the same profile pic etc but it's easy not to notice they are sean#3117 vs sean#3118 being the "real" Sean. There is a whole industry of people making bots etc to automatically detect and kick attempted impersonators precisely because this is such a problem.

jsmith45 3y ago
True, but the new system will only improve it a tiny bit. According to this post In most of the UI it will use your display name (or presumably your server nickname) which will be allowed to match other users. You can still have matching profile pics. To tell people apparat in the new system you need to click their profile and look at the username field, which only helps if the real user has a simpler username than the impersonator. Otherwise, like much like on Twitter, there is no good way for others to know which of @SeanHunter, @SeanHunterOfficial, @RealSeanHunter, is the real Sean Hunter and which ones are impersonators. The may all have identical display names, identical profile pictures, etc. So those anti impersonation systems will still be just as needed.
hinata08 3y ago
The transition is exactly the time for impersonation I hope they will protect some usernames that are shared by no other users (eg the name of artists) Malicious users could register the Twitter handle of popular artists, to impersonate them or to request a fee to have it back :/ I hope they thought that out.