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Hello everyone, I'm Callanecc, an administrator on account creation interface. Recently, our project has had an increased backlog in getting accounts for new users. Our numbers are currently over 250 people waiting for accounts on the English Wikipedia. If you could even spare a moment to do a few requests a day to help us clear this backlog, that would go a long way to encouraging new editors to participate with an account. If this interests you and you're willing to help, and you match the following description, then please do apply! Ideal users are:

• Identified to the Wikimedia Foundation or are willing and able to identify
• In good standing with no recent blocks or other sanctions
• Understand and are able to apply the username policy
• Have worked with new contributors
• Keep personal information confidential
• Please see the full list of requirements for more information

We have a very friendly team to help you get started, we also have a private IRC channel where you can ask questions or get help with difficult account requests. If you have any questions for us or about the process, feel free to ask at the talkpage. If you can help out, we would greatly appreciate it. For the ACC team,

I don't understand. Why on Earth is this necessary? Why can't the people just keep trying until they get a CAPTCHA that works or something? Wnt (talk) 17:06, 11 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Assuming you're referring to the request an account process; captcha is probably one of the least likely reasons that someone would request an account rather than create it themselves. There are plenty of reasons that people can't create a legitimate account but would like to, like schoolblocks, proxy blocks, or the requested username being similar to an inactive account. Samwalton9 (talk) 17:41, 11 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is absurd. Let's start with "too similar" -- I didn't even know there was such a criterion - I doubt anyone would care if you changed it. Given that half the people on en.wikipedia sign their posts with some bogus name that isn't their username we have much more significant sources of confusion to contend with"! I don't see where the criteria for "too similar" are listed, but if they're onerous, let's relax them. If they're reasonable (Cyrillic "a"...) then don't offer the service. Problem solved, no volunteers needed. Optional: start a log of inactive usernames. Any account not logged into within a year, with under 15 edits globally, gets recycled. To satisfy the CC license we have the software automatically put a copy of the account history in a logfile, and log the change of status ('account destroyed') to the history.

Schoolblocks/rangeblocks: expire them sooner, or tell people to log in somewhere else. For proxies, my skimming of the guideline is that you tell them to FOAD already, so there's nothing doing there anyway.

I never heard of this mechanism before today, but it seems like this bureaucratic makework will absorb as many volunteers as are thrown at it and always be hungry for more. Wnt (talk) 20:28, 11 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Similar accounts are caused by Antispoof, we can not change that at all since it is a global Wikimedia thing which is needed for the global unification system. Sometimes those blocks are hardblocked, therefore when we create their accoutns we also follow up IPBEs etc to make their editing experience better and such. Saying 'Sorry, create an account somewhere else' is extremely bad for editor retention. For the final comment, I am not going to say anything about that. John F. Lewis (talk) 20:38, 11 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't like the "etc." in the Antispoof documentation, but if it's all stuff like omicron for o, then allowing these similar but not identical accounts seems like a bad practice. Either you should have an automated way to expire and delete inactive accounts with few edits entirely, or else you should keep people from using similar names in every case. Allowing for the possibility that we may eventually run into two accounts later on with such an invisible difference between them is just bad policy. Especially if someone deliberately searches for expired accounts to hack their passwords and cause mischief. Wnt (talk) 21:27, 11 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What about User:WnT ? Mlpearc (open channel) 21:36, 11 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I think that's recognizable, and I wouldn't care if it existed. But I ran through quite a few possibilities before I found a three-letter name that I could register, and whatever the rules would be, I'd have to put up with them, even if it meant going to four. The key point is, if we agree on some technical mechanism to prevent confusion, subject to whatever arguments they may have about the extension over at MediaWiki, we shouldn't poke holes in it.

To give an example, suppose I were a reporter and I'd been aware of Antispoof before the great username merge between the projects. Why, I could have registered two or three names similar to every present, former, and candidate Arbcom member on en.wikipedia, on other projects! Left two or three edits each, and kept them around inactive, like Baldur's mistletoe, just waiting for the day some juicy salacious press case involving a school shooter or child predator. Then copied the real ArbCom member's userpage for my own, and left a message on some other arb's site - sorry, my webmail is down for days, can you send me all the stuff that was mailed out about the XXX case (just use emailthisuser...)? You see what I mean? So no, let's not deliberately create similar account names - we should be trying to get rid of those that currently exist whenever feasible. Wnt (talk) 17:59, 12 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Cal, I'm still interested and as far as I know my "application" is still active in the tool. Dusti was going to add me to the tool once my time since block exceeded six months, but he seems to have gone AWOL, and I am are at seven or eight months since that event now. Let me know if you're interested. Thanks. Technical 13 (talk) 00:22, 12 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there-- do I need to be over 18 to be identified to Wikimedia Foundation, or to be an account creator? I'm very interested in helping with this project if I'm allowed to, however, I am below 18 years old. I am willing to identify myself to WMF.

Thanks! -Newyorkadam (talk) 06:31, 17 January 2014 (UTC)Newyorkadam[reply]

Hi Newyorkadam, the requirements for gaining access to the actual account creator interface is you need to be over 18 and identified to the Foundatiom per the Access to nonpublic data policy. The main reason for this is that account creators on the interface have access to non public information about the request or such as their email and IP address. The account creator right is usually give to participants after they have been involved for the process for some time. I hope this answers your original questions, John F. Lewis (talk) 07:54, 21 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hi John, thanks for the reply, I understand. Thanks :) -Newyorkadam (talk)Newyorkadam

Hi there everyone, it's me again. I used to roll around these parts as an Account Creator, but I'll settle for being able to help out for just six shots at a time until I'm back up to full speed. Just re-enable access for the user of my name and I'll see what I can do to help! Cheers. -TIM^(Contact)/_(Contribs) 03:39, 8 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

 Done Please follow the procedure for mailing list and IRC channel access, thanks. John F. Lewis (talk) 05:24, 8 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, so I used to help out with ACC quite a while ago, and I'd like to help out again. Here is my confirmation and link to identification. My account is under the same name as my username (Parent5446) and is currently disabled for inactivity. If there's anything I need to do, just let me know. The IRC channel is private so I wasn't sure whether there is a public one I need to go to in order to register. — Parent5446 ☯ ^{( email)} 23:59, 2 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hello everyone, I'm John F. Lewis, an administrator on Wikipedia's account creation interface. Recently, our project has had an increased backlog in getting accounts for new users. Our numbers are currently over 400 people waiting for accounts on the English Wikipedia. If you could even spare a moment to do a few requests a day to help us clear this backlog, that would go a long way to encouraging new editors to participate with an account. If this interests you and you're willing to help, and you match the following description, then please do apply! Ideal users are:

• Identified to the Wikimedia Foundation or are willing and able to identify,
• In good standing with no recent blocks or other sanctions,
• Understand and are able to apply the username policy,
• Have worked with new contributors,
• Please see the full list of requirements for more information.

We have a very friendly team to help you get started, we also have a private IRC channel where you can ask questions or get help with difficult account requests. If you have any questions for us or about the process, feel free to ask at the talk page. If you can help out, we would greatly appreciate it. For the ACC team, John F. Lewis (talk) 18:02, 29 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@John F. Lewis: Email sent to the list. Sam Walton (talk) 19:16, 29 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Received and approved. Follow the usual instructions for mailing list and IRC access and I'll unsuspend your account now. Thanks, John F. Lewis (talk) 19:18, 29 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Just as a note (not suggesting any changes here), I used to be very active in WP:ACC, but that's when it was a wiki-based system. Moving to an email-based system (and presumably to a web-form-based system since) was good for privacy, but it meant a sufficient amount of extra complexity that I just gave up on the whole thing (and eventually ended up drifting away from Wikipedia, because it was my major area of admin activity). Back then, it was something simple and quick that anyone could do (both admins and non-admins were needed for technical reasons; I had a non-admin sock User:ais523 non-admin at least partly for that purpose). Nowadays, WP:ACC/G is listing a set of restrictions on account creation that are more reminiscent of RfA than anything else, and so I'm not particularly surprised that you're having problems finding people to go through the account creation system.

The process would likely be a lot less backlogged if you could find some way to reduce or remove the process creep. (In particular, I'm not entirely convinced there's even a need to see nonpublic information to be able to perform a decent chunk of account creation requests; the only reason we used to need it was to set the email address of the new account, and I can easily imagine some web-based system that could handle that without ever showing the account approver the information.) --ais523 05:46, 11 October 2015 (UTC)

The account creation form unfortunately does display the email and it is required to be passed on the form which in any sense would have it displayed in any API calls. IP information is also extremely helpful and in fact a staple for users on the tool as checking for proxies (per m:NOP) or range blocks (e.g. checkuserblocks, schoolblocks, vandalismblocks, oversight blocks and so on) allow users to gain and insight and assess accounts before going a head with creation. The information can also support in make case-by-case decisions such as someone wants the username 'Bill Thompson' and they have a wikipedia page stating they're a governor of an area, email and IP information allows the person working on the request to decide whether or not they are said person or not. John F. Lewis (talk) 19:28, 11 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The problem with IP/rangeblocks isn't something I'd thought of (basically because the old process required a wiki edit, and thus if you were blocked you wouldn't have been able to make a request in the first place). I assume that WP:ACC is nowadays more about letting people create an account through an IP block, than it is about overriding AntiSpoof (which is what it used to be mostly for), in which case it's sort-of turning into a second UTRS. --ais523 22:34, 12 October 2015 (UTC)

Please see WT:PERM#Automating procedural removal of account creator rights — MusikAnimal ^talk 19:04, 15 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]