Larry and I just discussed the idea of having a "lottery" system for usernames which are freed up through an eventual user deletion system for dropping inactive users -- if we even build such a thing.
I told Larry I wanted to build it auction-style, but Larry's not keen on the idea of turning AP into a "currency" to spend on things, and instead came up with the idea of a lottery where we let 100 qualifying users put their account into a pool to "win" a new username. Qualifying, of course, would depend on when you last changed your username, etc.
also the requirement should probably a certain amount of karma and if if a mod see's a usual troller when he/she is patrolling the forums they can just take away the ability to change karma levels indefinitely
The proper term for creating numerous alternate accounts to support yours is sockpuppeting. The Merit Recognition was taken down because users sockpuppeted by making alts and nominating themselves. Referrals were taken down because people make numerous sockpuppet accounts to give themselves referral points.
Think of a puppeteer controlling multiple puppets.
I'm a little confused on how you guys came up with this, to be honest
I had the idea at lunch while Larry and I discussed deleting inactive accounts, and how so many people would want dibs on the username "1337" that we should give you folks a way to compete for the names.
display names
We don't want to do display names or nicknames, because that potentially reserves twice as many usernames as there are right now.
We don't want to do display names or nicknames, because that potentially reserves twice as many usernames as there are right now.
Alright, I understand that..
I had the idea at lunch while Larry and I discussed deleting inactive accounts, and how so many people would want dibs on the username "1337" that we should give you folks a way to compete for the names.
Heh, that's interesting. Not all names would be in such wild demand though.
Hehe, the admins have lunch. I can haz steal those vege chips things the office was madly into a while ago?
In my opinion, a currency could be created which involved playing the games, i.e getting credits for completing achievements, as that cannot really be spammed for. But then, for those who don't have enough time (or skill) to play the games, it could be unfair.
The idea of a lottery is somewhat interesting, it could cause debate though...
Have a thread where people pick a number between 1-100, and then use random.org?
In my opinion, a currency could be created which involved playing the games, i.e getting credits for completing achievements, as that cannot really be spammed for. But then, for those who don't have enough time (or skill) to play the games, it could be unfair.
The currency should also involve other activities too, but I'm lost to think of any right now.. Games are good.
One of my college projects was building a random number generator from scratch, taking system "entropy" (signal noise on the plugs and ports like the user moving their mouse) and using that to calculate something as close to perfectly random as possible. Good times.
