MULTIPLE ACCOUNTS (and why you don't want to use them here!)

[Teresa Edgerton]

Lately there have been several instances where individuals have registered multiple accounts: one was a previously banned member returning to repeat the same behavior that led to him being banned in the first place, and several have obviously been spammers conversing with themselves about whatever it is they are trying to promote. In the past, we have also seen this behavior from internet trolls and other mischief makers.

Please be aware that multiple accounts are not allowed on the Chronicles forums, in order that we may maintain that atmosphere of trust and that high standard of conduct and civil discourse our members have come to expect.

We, the moderators, realize that sometimes there are perfectly innocent reasons why someone may have, or appear to have, more than one account at this site. Family members use the same computer. A person might return to Chronicles after a long time and forget their user name and/or password (if this happens to you, we can reset your password for you). You may have been an ASciFi member under another name before the two forums merged. Or it might have been done as a "harmless" joke by someone not aware of our policy. However, we don't appreciate people using multiple accounts to deceive other members, just to see if they can get away with it. See the statement above about an atmosphere of trust.

If any of these situations apply to you, and Staff members don't already know about it, now would be a very good time to let us know. If it comes to our attention in some other way (and once suspicions are aroused, it's usually easy for us to confirm them), you may be subject to an infraction, and if there is evidence of malicious intent, or an attempt to circumvent our other rules, a ban is sure to follow.

To put it more simply, even though we know there are instances where two or more people share an IP, or where someone may return after a long lapse of time under a new name any individual who has active accounts using two or more different names is breaking a rule, no matter how harmless their intent.

Please take this seriously, because we do. Chronicles members have created a unique and valuable community. Help us to keep it that way.

[The Bloated One]

Teresa,

I had an earlier account, under the name of 'the Bloated Shagganat', I haven't used it since I became 'The Bloated One'. More than happy if you removed the Bloated Shagganat.

TBO

[Teresa Edgerton]

OK, so noted. Thanks for letting us know.

For future reference (not just yours, but for anyone else who might be contemplating a name change), you can get the name on an existing account changed for you by asking admin to do it.

[I, Brian]

Also, just to add, this is mainly directed towards people who have multiple *active* accounts - dormant accounts aren't really a concern, as much as avoiding individual members using multiple accounts which could mislead others, or else be used disruptively in the community.

[Mirannan]

I have a question about this, not being any sort of networking tech wizard. AFAIK, all the PCs attached to Virgin Media's network in the UK share the same IP as all others in a fairly large area (county size, probably) as far as the rest of the Internet is concerned. Is this true, and is it likely to cause problems given this board's stated policy?

[I, Brian]

Nope, no problem. Virgin media cover a lot of IP addresses. It's the user rather than IP's that define multiple accounts.

[TheTomG]

Mirannan, your modem will be granted its own unique IP. I's impossible to have all computers in the area have the same IP, as then every request for a web site would be answered back to all those computers

They will all belong to the same IP block, which will be allocated to Virgin, and they will allocate one of those IPs from that block to one modem on their system. Your IP may change over time, as it will be dynamic rather than static (though generally unless your modem is disconnected from the network for a period of time, it will continue to renew it's lease on the IP it was given, so you will in effect keep the same IP address for some time.)

On an offshoot, the ISP will keep a list of who had what IP on what date, and said information can be subpoenaed for legal reasons (eg copyright infringement, sending of threatening messages, etc.)

As another note, if you have a router, it then hands out IPs of its own to each piece of equipment on your network. However, this will be a private IP, and only of use inside your home network (and on that front, your IP on your home network may well be the same as my computer's IP on my network - but that IP never makes it out into the internet, only my router knows and cares about those particular IP addresses, and once the traffic goes out into the internet it all points to my modem with just the same reference to that modem regardless of what device on my home network sent out the communication.)

As for no multiple accounts - what will my multiple personalities do now?

On a more serious note, I believe in putting my name to the things I say, so not only do I have just one account but hey, it's based on my name too! Not much of one for hiding behind fake identities (I just find it SO hard to be fake, it's not worth the effort - which means I suck at role play as every character I play turns out to be me....)