User:Whiteknight/Renaming and Usurpation

'''This page represents my rules only, and does not necessarily represent how other bureaucrats handle these issues. Wikibooks has no official policy about user renaming or username usurpation. If I cannot or will not help you, another bureaucrat might be willing or able to.'''

As a bureaucrat, I'm able to rename user accounts for people upon request. I'm also able, in some situations, to perform a usurpation. A usurpation is where we "steal" an existing account from one person to give to another person. Here on en.wikibooks there are no official policies concerning user renaming and usurpation, these are left up to the best discretion of the bureaucrats. However, to simplify the process and to answer some common questions, this page is going to serve as a bit of my "personal policy".

To start this whole rename process, you can send me a request to my user talk page, or you can post a request on the Administrator's Noticeboard.

Some rules concerning acceptable renames

 * Here at Wikibooks, we require that usernames must be appropriate. I will not change your user name to something with cursewords or offensive words.
 * I will not rename you to something that is similar to another person's username, with the intention to confuse people. I will not, for instance, rename you to "VVhiteknight" or something like that.
 * I will probably not rename you to a foreign word which I do not understand. I only speak English, so I will only handle rename requests for English usernames. I'm sorry in advance for this, but I cannot verify if a word written in another language is appropriate or not. If I can find a translator who is able to verify the appropriateness of your name, I will consider it. Other bureaucrats may be willing to perform requests like this, and if possible I will refer you to one of them.
 * I will not rename a person to a name which uses non-latin characters. If I make a typo in such a username I will probably not notice it and I may not be able to correct it. Again, I apologize for this, but I would rather not be making all sorts of uncorrectable mistakes with this tool. Other bureaucrats may be willing to do this, and I will refer you to them in that case.

SUL Concerns
Single User Login (SUL) is a software addition that is in the works, where user accounts on all WMF wikis are going to be combined. Because of SUL before performing a rename I may check to ensure that the account name you are requesting is not already taken at en.wikipedia. This is to prevent username collisions, or concerns over dopplegangers (people with the same name on different projects to cause problems).

If you are the same person on en.wikipedia or another wiki and you are requesting a rename here to match that username, I must see proof that you are the same person as that account. For more information about proof, see the section Proof That You Are The Same Person below.

What I need from you

 * You must have an email address registered with the software before I will rename you. Go to Special:Preferences and make sure that there is an email address entered there. This is so that if you lose your password information, that you can retrieve it. In the event of a problem, I can contact you via email to correct it.

Being Renamed
Once you have satisfied all the requirements above, I will rename you as requested. I will email you a confirmation once it is completed. The rename process automatically moves your user page and user talk page (and all subpages) to the new location. Do not create new pages in your new user space until I rename you. This complicates the process, and pages will need to get deleted.

Once you have been renamed, all your user settings are the same, and you have the same password. You may contact me at any time if you have questions about this.

Usurpable Usernames

 * The account to be usurped should satisfy the following conditions:
 * The account has few, if any edits, image uploads, or log entries.
 * The account has not been used recently (and I get do define "recently")
 * The account does not have a valid email address specified (if an email address is available, you should ask the user permission to usurp the username, or at least give fair warning).
 * If the account that you are usurping is permanently blocked due to vandalism or some other reason, I can usurp that account without question.

Before Usurpation, You Must:

 * Provide me with some way to contact you off-wiki. If you have an email address registered with your account, and if you set it so that you are able to receive mail from other users, I can use the Special:Emailuser page to contact you. Otherwise, you must provide me with an email address or a messenger chat ID, or you must contact me on IRC. When I usurp the account, I will send you the username and password information off-wiki.

Proof That You Are The Same Person
If you are a member of another wikimedia project and would like to have the same username here as well, you must:
 * 1) Edit that wiki with an edit summary that states that you are the same person.
 * 2) Post a diff link to this edit here on Wikibooks or through some other method so I can verify that you are the same person.

There may be other ways to verify your identity as well, although I doubt that any of them are easier then this. Contact me if you need to work out some other method (and have a good explanation ready for why you need it).