[Enshittification][DO NOT ADD] Discord Username System
Did you know? Discord is reworking/removing their partnership program (as it currently stands)
Hey there @everyone! Been about 2 months since I changed this post. And it's been a hot minute, but the username update has now been worked into Discord. No matter if we liked it or not. And people will now (forcefully) get used to it.
As a suprise, this idea has the MOST ever comments and votes recieved on a single post on the feedback platform EVER. The story around this event is the most interesting I have ever seen. And the gerne around it still hasn't ended either. We'll see where all of this goes.
On that note, I have been working on a little project regarding that, since Twitter, Discord, Reddit and Tiktok are heading all into the same route. Our own little enshittification.social! A mastodon instance for the enshittification of companies and they services they used to offfer. (Twitter, Unity, Discord, and so on)
Would you like to participate in an UNOFFCIAL poll? Click here!
(NOT affiliated with Discord in any way, shape or form)
We thank everyone for their votes, comments and joining our DIscord server and enshittification instance. The story of enshittification will never end and we can see that with the recent Unity Pricing changes.
I've recieved a press request through Discord, however I'm moving that to email, if any press wants to reach out about the update from someone willing to represent the entire discord community against this change, send an email here:
- press@stefanocoding.me
Need more information? Check NTTS's Video:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3LUtBVe3Jk
Want to talk with people about the update? Check this server:
- https://discord.gg/jpFhkeqGHS
An anonymous Discord Partner has spoken out about the reservations, check it out.
- Original post was deleted by reddit admins, link is now for archive.org
Hey, even game devs are struggeling getting their official name as verified servers:
- https://www.gamesradar.com/indie-studio-has-their-discord-username-stolen-out-from-under-them/
- https://twitter.com/rustylakecom/status/1659556388526338048
So what is it with this update?
So generally, this update has recieved a TON of backlash. And this feedback post has already recieved just about 13k upvotes at the time of writing AND a change.org petition with 13k people having signed it,
Fundementally this change to discord is going to cause more issue's for it's users then it could be worth. Among the comments, there are a few I'll display/mention.
One of the major issues that can be confirmed is the resale of Discord accounts. That is something that is unable to be denied and is going to be a major issue. Example here:
What discord has done absolutly wrong during this update:
Discord staff has been claiming double the names, one for their private account. Another for their staff account. Some of these usernames that are being claimed are so rare that people are speculating they are planning to sell it one day or another. The communication is absolute crap, they have not communicated how they where planning to do the roll-out and the way people are now claiming names left and right, from piewdiepie, markiplier and other names that should have been reserved. Then the way access get's rolled out? Verified bots where supposed to get access first, then supposedly brands, moving on to the staff and then the partnered and verified servers. Then the general population. But this has so far changed even more, starting with people from the moderator program, and suddenly the Hypesquad event team. And we still do not have enough information to know what the next bracket will be. There is no proper communication apart from Discord telling us to append our tag/discriminator to our usernames if we can't use it. Or you know just don't make usernames unique. The reddit has been stormed with people hating this update. And when people go to the support page, they're told to respond to feedback, or create it. We've all done this, but Discord still hasn't made an official statement. The entire update wasn't even properly announced like they do with everything else. Hidden behind their Birthday suprises. With the nitro trails providing people with 2 weeks of nitro to forget they signed up and pay an additional month. Normally, this would be tweeted and announced everywhere properly. People are moving away from Discord in an attempt to revolt, they're disbanding Nitro to put a dent somewhere in Discord's earnings. But that'll probably be recouped by investors. Discord claims to listen to feedback. But we've seen nothing of this yet. As a ton of people are saying, Discord is turning into Twitter, we don't want to see it happen. But with the 300 million active users on Discord, we're barely making a dent with this feedback post.
What are some good ways to fix this update?
The previous system worked perfectly, nothing to change about it. However using the display name system is a good idea. Maybe even supporting for official known people to get a username, or a checkmark to define "hey they are official" without the Twitter "pay for a blue tick" bs.
> BELOW ARE COMMENTS MADE BY THE COMMUNITY, NOT BY ME DIRECTLY <
Mikey's, Gen, Rain
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+1
What a TERRIBLE idea! It's like they want to be another unintellligible social media slop clone. The number tags were perfectly good already. They say it's to make things simpler which is stupid stupid. With the original system we could have, say, 9999 users named Joe and if you wanted that name too you could just make a little tweak to it like Joey or Joseph or Jojo or someting. With this youd have to be @/xx.j03s3p4.xx which is arguably harder to tell someone than J0ey#1234 is.
Not to mention what this means for name snipers! Us in the ROBLOX ccommunity have already seen this happen (where people charge crazy amount for real word usernames) and you know what the developers did? Added nicknames so anybody could have the name they wanted. Discord is doing this in reverse basically, taking the appeal of having whatever short name you want away and replacing it with a slurry of numbers and underscores. Also to tack this on it will probably result in people with short or rw usernames being harassed in DMs.
Anyways, if this is rolled out it's safe to say I will not be throwing any more of my money at subscriptions .3.17 -
oh, a feature that only benefits scammers and online stalkers. thanks discord.
18 -
this will only end badly
14 -
+1
12 -
There's so many problems with this. Most have already been mentioned, but I'll add a few more.
- Uniqueness is messy and limits users. The more users you have, the worse those problems become. The best solution allows everyone to have their preferred username and hides the messy part except when necessary. Your old system did this perfectly. It was one of the best parts of Discord and made it superior to other services.
- Making every username unique with a built-in four number code is infinitely preferable to forcing users to do that themselves. Is Name1234 really better than Name#1234 ? Or more likely, XxXx_name_xXxX ? At least with your previous system, those four numbers were usually hidden. Users didn't have to worry about making their usernames unique, and could just focus on being themselves.
- "Your Preferred Username is Taken" is one of the most frustrating messages when signing up for a social media account. Don't make Discord worse by bringing it here.
- As Discord grows, it needs to be able to accommodate more users, and the more users you have, the more people's preferred usernames will clash. This only makes the problem worse. It's a move in the wrong direction. Even Xbox and Blizzard are doing the opposite.
- The only downside to discriminators was needing to look them up for new users to add their first friends. But there are alternatives like QR-code scanning and server invite links. And after that, nearly all friends are added through mutual servers. You are fixing a tiny problem by regressing your entire system.
I always thought the developers at Discord were engaged with their community. The decision to not ask for input before making such a massive change is absolutely mind-boggling. The backlash is well-deserved, and I hope you decide to listen.
19 -
1. Half of the reason I was paying for my (highest-tier) Nitro sub was so I could change my identifier #. With this change there'll genuinely be no reason for me to give your platform money. I can just upload the gifs I want from other servers, I really don't care about having a gif icon or user header. If I NEED to link a large file or video to someone Google Drive is absolutely free. I and a lot of others have already cancelled and put down this change as our reason. You're going to lose money on this. You're already losing money on this.
2. Someone else put it more eloquently than me, so I'm going to just screenshot them talking about the issue with this change "New usernames are restricted to only Latin, alphanumeric characters and select special characters ( _ and . )"
3. Account selling, attempts at hacking accounts with "rare" or "canon" (or even just short) usernames will skyrocket. You're effectively creating a username blackmarket (search on tumblr or twitter "url uft/ufs" or "username uft/ufs" and you'll quickly see how big and cutthroat it is) through artificial scarcity. Also one of the appeals of your platform was changing my tag to literally anything I wanted. No other platform I can think of has this appeal. The tag format is also iconic (something you'll lose for marketing and recognizability).
4. I've been digitally stalked multiple times before, my discord is one of the only accounts I've been able to keep for multiple years because there wasn't a searchable Pomelo Tag System (@username) while I was being stalked. This change will remove that safety and that makes me (and many of my friends) anxious. Not to even touch the amounts of impersonation that are going to happen.You've already anticipated this, since we won't be able to make usernames with "discord" in them (but you haven't done the same for slurs?), so you know how bad of an idea this is. DON'T DO THIS!EDIT: Here's the Change.org petition with 13,965 (verified) people and COUNTING who are asking you NOT to do this.
22 -
For the love of everything that is holy, do not change the current system of usernames. If you read the comments that people made already, you will see why this idea is horrible. Aside from those ones, this identity is mine and the one that I have had for seven years and still counting- I am sure that Discord might see why I am not exactly “cool” with possibly throwing it away on their app over this change. +1, all of the way.
16 -
+1
The arguments used FOR the change is literally just cherrypicking non-issues. Never in my entire time on Discord have I encountered users who've had trouble with the current discriminator username system - I'd know, I've ran a server for 5+ years that have had VERY young and not-tech-savy people join and not a single one of them had difficulty!
As well as points others have made about name sniping and such.
Not to mention this now gets rid of one of the Nitro perks of customizing your discriminator number. As a result of ALL of this, I've already cancelled my Nitro subscription and my Nitro Boosts, it's just not worth it at this point with the perk removal and the backwardness of this username change in general.23 -
The "new" system is terrible. DO NOT DO THIS. Its an archaic username scheme
23 -
This change is absurd. It decreases the general user experience (being able to change your name whenever you want to whatever you want) and also VASTLY worsens the quality of user privacy and safety. People will be harassed and hacked because of this. It's a horrible decision on every level, and I don't know why Discord would even want to mimic sites like Twitter right now. It's not like things are going great for Twitter.
20 -
Agreed, this is by far a completely unhelpful change. It's will literally only introduce new problems, because what it's meant to "solve" isn't even an issue to begin with.
17 -
Each day I grow closer and closer to the day where I will retire this accursed application. Change enough, and everybody will share my sentiment. They will leave. Cease to change things that never needed change. Start to accommodate for human beings, and their desires within this platform. Idiots
+1 do not change this don't twitterify this bru hlmao13 -
13 -
cancelling my subscription right away lmao
20 -
+1
13 -
+1
I used to switch names fairly frequently, and I have a few names & variations that I like to go by. This change would vary my Discord experience a lot and I'm not happy about it. Non-unique usernames have been one of Discord's best unsung features.Not to mention, forcing username changes on almost EVERY single user is definitely not going to help people find their friends more easily! Implementing a change that would affect less users at the moment, and less people in the long run, would be much more reasonable.
Something that could help people identify who's who more easily could be making profile notes searchable, and DM contents searchable from a menu. (although maybe those should be password-protected?)
I also agree that all of the issues other users are pointing out are very relevant. Seriously, it's not too late to go back.
21 -
horrible update, no one actually has an issue with telling people their usernames. in the years i've had my account, everyone i've added from out of discord has just written their name down and showed me it that way. this is stupid
16 -
Don't do this at all. You want more people dropping out of Nitro? This is how you'll get them to do it.
16 -
Come on discord. Why did you even think this was a good idea? Just add two numbers to the discriminator and make sure you don't hide it in the UI (so that people know it exists). Problems solved, without this bullshit that will make account sniping, scams, and all sorts of other issues more apparent.
14 -
This system doesn't need changing at ALL. The four number tag works wonders for letting users pick unique names without having to go through so much trouble like back in the days of Runescape and so on where we had to find some absolutely asinine jumble of untaken characters to pass as a username. The system's elegant and doesn't need fixing.
16 -
+1, if this rolls out, I'm deleting and taking my Nitro with me, and will add discord to pi-hole block lists.
Think the crypto scams are bad? It's going to get MUCH. MUCH. WORSE.
Dumbasses. All around.
17 -
I've been using discord for years and all of the "issues" they've mentioned are quite literally never problems that have come up. If I want to share my username I just write it down or type it into a friend's phone myself. The vast majority of people KNOW and UNDERSTAND the discriminator system. Plus, I like that the four-number discriminator keeps my account more private. I don't want everyone being able to message my Discord - It's a PRIVATE MESSAGING service for me. I talk on my own terms. I don't want Discord to become more like other social media sites. It's fine the way it is. This is an awful change, and it needs to stop.
I've been considering buying Nitro, but now I know I shouldn't waste my money when the platform is making changes like this completely out of the blue without consulting the userbase first.
19 -
+1
This change is awful and perpetuates the very issues it claims to fix. This is not a solution and whoever was in charge of this decision needs to rethink this from square one.
19 -
+1
you made me log in to this account just to tell you this is a bad update. please don't make the cyberstalkers' jobs this much easier
22 -
They keep arguing that "it's hard to memorize a 4 digit number" and let me just say, memorizing numbers is easy. I mean people memorize numbers their whole lives. 4 digits isn't that hard. Have trouble? Write it down, you'll get it eventually.
17 -
this change is so shit
16 -
Next, they're going to try selling you a verification checkmark.
17 -
dont you love when corporate is out of touch with the very thing they dictate?
and yeah, i read the blogpost. its possible to lose touch even as the creator. please do better19 -
This supposed "solution" is bizarre and entirely ineffective. As many have already said, all it does is create more problems - and there are many. I like my name, and I like my numbers 👺
If Discord goes ahead with this decision, it would mean losing my core identity on the platform. As a result, I will likely cancel my Nitro subscription in response.
17 -
Cool so instead of someone being "name#3527" they'll have to be "name3527" because their name was already taken. Except someone out there has "name" now and you don't. Cool.
Social app developers not ruin their app for no reason challenge failed as always.17
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