User talk:91.197.170.85O

This account has been blocked indefinitely from editing Wikipedia because your username, 91.197.170.85O, looks misleadingly like an IPv4 address. You are encouraged to choose a new account name that meets our policy guidelines. Alternatively, if you have already made edits and you wish to keep your existing contributions under a new name, then you may request a change in username by:
 * Adding on your user talk page. You should be able to do this even though you are blocked, as you can usually still edit your own talk page. If not, you may wish to contact the blocking administrator by clicking on "E-mail this user" on their talk page.
 * At an administrator's discretion, you may be unblocked for 24 hours to file a request.
 * Please note that you may only request a name that is not already in use, so please check here for a listing of already taken names. The account is created upon acceptance, thus do not try to create the new account before making the request for a name change. For more information, please see Changing username.

If you feel that you were blocked in error, you may appeal this block by adding below this notice the text, but you should read our guide to appealing blocks first. -- The Anome (talk) 18:08, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

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Assume good faith

Hi there. I'm sorry, but even assuming good faith, it's hard to accede to your request.

I hope you understand the reason for the existence of the rule in the first place. The problem with IP-address-lookalike usernames is that we often cannot be sure that one corresponds to the other. Anyone could set up a username that looks like any IP, creating potential confusion that the rule is designed to prevent.

In your case, we have the unusual case that you have edited from the claimed IP address to confirm that the pseudo-IP-address username is yours, so we know that this confusion does not exist right now. However, although I'm sympathetic to your request, I can't see any reason to make an exception to the general rule, even in this case.

This might sound unfair, but here's why. IP addresses are just not good things to use as nyms. Even if we know your username and IP address correspond 1:1 now, we cannot be sure that they will correspond in the future, as ISPs frequently reassign IP addresses to different users, either by changing user addresses in "dynamic IP" setups (which can change hourly, or stay the same for months -- there's no guarantee at all), or even if these users have what they believe is a contractual right to a "static IP" (which is very unlikely -- your ISP does not "own" their IP address block in the same way as land or property in the first place, so they can't give it to you to "own" in turn.) This is going to happen a lot more in future, as pressure from IPv4 address exhaustion makes the shuffling-around of IPv4 addresses more and more necessary (and profitable) for service provider. Or it might simply happen when you move from one ISP to another -- or even if you turn your interface off for a few hours or days. Or you might just decide temporarily to edit from another location. If/when this happens, there would then again be the confusion we sought to avoid in the first place, but now with a long history from one or both of the confusable identities. (For example, how could we deal with arguments between the "old" 91.197.170.85 and the "new" 91.197.170.85 about who the "real" account holder of 91.197.170.85O is? Or requests from 91.197.170.85O to disassociate themselves from 91.197.170.85's edits?)

This is what the rule against IP-lookalike usernames is designed to prevent. Weird and unlikely though these sorts of scenarios might seem, people have been observed to do some very weird things on Wikipedia. This is something we can avoid up front by simply following the rule, before the problem happens.

I hope you find my rationale for this acceptable. If you could register a new account with a name that does not refer to an IP address, that would save everyone a lot of bother in the long term. There would be no problem with your identifying that page with your current IP address on its talk page, or claiming credit for your earlier edits there. Please accept my apologies about this. The Anome (talk) 19:47, 29 December 2011 (UTC)