[wp-docs] User accounts

[Tor Bjornrud]

Podz wrote:
> 1 - Users are NOT removed.
> Now this is either an absolute rule or it is pointless. Right now, we 
> have a user called "A2gay.org.uk" who has made no contributions. If 
> tomorrow I wake and find that we have A3, A4 .... A999 then they stay 
> too. Yes ?

I think in the case that someone is clearly abusing the account system 
and codex, it's perfectly alright to delete an account.  This is very 
different from someone just creating an acct and leaving it, imho.

> 2 - We (I'll cheerfully do it) go through and delete ALL users who have 
> made no contribution. I would think that a period of warning (a month ?) 
> to ask users to create a user page or make a small change anywhere which 
> simply indicates that they are there are active.
> 
> It's simply about keeping a decent house, and I do not see why we have 
> to copy what this wiki or that wiki is doing - it's Codex, we built it, 
> we make the rules, and if one of our rules is that you have to have made 
> a contribution to stay, then why not ?

I haven't weighed in on this yet, but I think it's a bad policy given 
that the codex is supposed to be an inclusive project.  Who's to say 
that someone who created an acct got distracted and didn't get to 
contribute?  I know I poked around the codex for quite a while before 
ever posting, and even now I haven't done all that much.  But if I had 
found that my account was deleted because of inactivity, that would've 
been quite discouraging.

Basically, I value making the codex more inviting to occasional editors 
FAR more than saving some user account real estate, which is practically 
free.

In addition, leaving accounts fits the open-source commons that we're 
trying to build with the WordPress community.  It's fine to have a 
meritocracy, and works extremely well, but I don't think that needs to 
conflict with welcoming users and contributors with open arms.  Deleting 
user accounts *can* be perceived as the contributor not being "good 
enough" to be in our club.

Leave no contributor behind.

~Tor