1

Hey guys! I was looking at the user creation log and it just happened that I stumbled across a user named Http:a2z-seo-backlinks.com and someone left them a welcome, and then another user came along and put a {{username}}. What should I do now?

2

Sit back and watch the fireworks. The username is an advertisement - I’ve seen some pretty bad ones, but going out and making your username a website isn’t a good idea.

3

The username looks fine to me. Neither “advertising” or “not being a good idea” are in the policy. We have two scenarios here: 1. They create the account and never edit again. Only a welcomer and a patroller see it, and it is ignored forever. Or 2, they contribute daily for years. We heart our new editor and they get their name shown off.

4

Or 3, they spam and we block them. Hopefully #2 .

5

In this case, it seems the most likely to be either 1 or 3. This is what worries me.

6

For the record, it’s totally okay for someone to use a website name as a username. In fact, this is one of the ways we encourage people to promote themselves: http://www.wikihow.com/Publicize-Yourself-the-Right-Way-on-wikiHow We don’t want people plastering their link all over wikiHow. But for people who are genuinely trying to become recognized as experts on a certain area of expertise, making their username into their website name is acceptable. They will only get clicks/traffic if their edits are actually good and helpful. If they are not…their account name pretty much disappears into oblivion.

7
  1. They leave without a trace and there’s no love lost. 3. They spam, we revert all that, block them, and there’s no love lost.