Require Discord userid on registration

[Justis]

Discord is arguably the worst platform for doing business deals.

From https://www.mc-market.org/wiki/confirming-identities/

There is no public profile or record for Discord users and no means of tracking identities...
Discord uses numbers (called discriminators) at the end of usernames in order to identify an account. However, these numbers are completely unreliable. Anyone may purchase nitro to change these numbers and if the nitro subscription expires, those numbers will randomly scramble, thus leaving any previously publicized contact information incorrect.

However, Discord nonetheless remains the most used platform for our community members to conduct their business.

The only reliable means of identifying a Discord account is its userid, available only with developer mode turned on.

In order to reduce the opportunity for impersonation, we recently added a contact field specifically for discord userids. However, few people may bother to fill this in.

To more firmly encourage its usage, how would the community feel about us adding it as a requirement to the registration page? Those without a discord account could of course fill in "N/A" or something similar, but our previous inclusion of "Skype" on the registration page proves that including it results in a far higher probability of it being filled out.

 

[Jasmine]

I think this is a really nice suggestion and could potentially teach them the concept about Discord IDs if it's an optional thing.

+1 from me definitely

 

[Polarbears]

You make a valid point and this could be a good step in the right direction, but one thing you said makes me question. How do we know the "N/A" or something similar" will not be the new way of avoiding a discord user ID but still making deals on the platform?

 

[Justis]

You make a valid point and this could be a good step in the right direction, but one thing you said makes me question. How do we know the "N/A" or something similar" will not be the new way of avoiding a discord user ID but still making deals on the platform?

We cannot force users to provide a valid Discord account. There are those that may not use Discord.
However, if someone contacts you over Discord but does not verify their account through the usage of this field, you are surely able to ask them "Why haven’t you verified your account?" to which they will be unable to provide a reasonable answer. You should then require that they verify through usage of this field before dealing with them. Refusal to do so should be seen as incredibly suspicious.

 

[Zyger]

That would be a good idea yeah, but you should add a link to a tutorial on how to get the ID, and some sort of check to see if they're entering a discord ID and not just their tag

 

[Ally]

requirement

If you're letting people put enter N/A or similar, then it's not a requirement.
Going to be really pedantic here and argue that the title and this ^ is misleading.

With that being said; new members to the market may not actually know how discord IDs work -- or more, far more importantly, experienced with them and identities. You're assuming these are experienced people joining - and that's usually the case if they're ban evading or moving from another similar marketplace that relies on similar mechanics. So yeah in theory this would be great but realistically aren't going to know everything about this. (Wiki included)

 

[Jasmine]

With that being said; new members to the market may not actually know how discord IDs work -- or more, far more importantly, experienced with them and identities. You're assuming these are experienced people joining - and that's usually the case if they're ban evading or moving from another similar marketplace that relies on similar mechanics. So yeah in theory this would be great but realistically aren't going to know everything about this. (Wiki included)

Definitely agree. I myself had no idea what these IDs were until I had help and a youtube tutorial. So definitely this will be confusing. Perhaps a video or a guide when signing up

 

[Bug]

Definitely agree. I myself had no idea what these IDs were until I had help and a youtube tutorial. So definitely this will be confusing. Perhaps a video or a guide when signing up

Even then, it would discourage members from signing up in general, if it was a requirement as requested by the thread users would not be arsed to watch a 5 min video explaining how you get your discord it, and then again if it can just be set as N/A then it pretty much serves no purpose since they'll just leave it.

 

[Wezel]

yes, but tell ppl how to do it and ur good to go

 

[Samuel]

We cannot force users to provide a valid Discord account. There are those that may not use Discord.
However, if someone contacts you over Discord but does not verify their account through the usage of this field, you are surely able to ask them "Why haven’t you verified your account?" to which they will be unable to provide a reasonable answer. You should then require that they verify through usage of this field before dealing with them. Refusal to do so should be seen as incredibly suspicious.

This response is the entire reason why requiring it on sign up is not needed.

 

[Lotus]

Why force users to fill something like N/A? Just make it an optional input that users can choose to fill in or not.

I’m not opposed to the suggestion, but I think if you aren’t bothered to verify via MCM PMs, you most definitely won’t be bothered to activate developer mode and confirm user IDs on every deal with a new person, especially if you aren’t even a developer/tech savvy. I’m definitely not bothered with the latter.

I’m not too sure about this, but perhaps there’s a way to verify your Discord account through MCM via their OAuth API?

Impersonation works because people are too lazy to verify who they’re dealing with. I feel the OAuth suggestion, if it’s actually possible idk, is far more accessible and convenient to lazier individuals than Discord IDs.

 

[flamelier]

The only issue with that verifying through MCM with their OAuth API, is there isn't public access to it yet, Mick said it would come out to Ultimate eventually. Once that is done, I plan on building several discord bots, or just one massive one that use the API to verify, check profiles, display information, etc. If I can save at least one person from being scammed I think it would be worth it.

Also turning on developer mode isn't to hard on discord, plus once on, it stays on until you turn it off. I personally turned it on and use the IDs often. That should be more public information on here. Let us share it with everyone so they can be safe and avoid impersonators.

 

[Landon]

Like Ally said, I don't think Discord IDs are something that the casual Discord user uses.

I see three potential scenarios with this:

1. The user does not have a Discord account.
They will simply enter "N/A". Then, as they gain experience on the forum, they will realize a lot of business is done via Discord, and make an account. Then you're back at the original problem that you mentioned: "few people may bother to fill this in."

2. The user has a Discord account but does not know how to get their ID.
While providing a tutorial could work, pushing efforts to go through tedious steps is not viable when it comes to trying and get users to register for your website. 1) They enable Developer mode, and we have their ID. 2) They don't feel like going through the steps and a) cancel registration b) fill in "N/A".

3. The user has a Discord account and knows how how to get their ID.
The scenario we are trying to achieve.

Overall, I think the idea is good, but there are some pitfalls with it. Either we end up where we started, with users leaving their Discord ID blank, you lose a potential member, or we actually get their ID. 1/3 odd isn't great when the other 2/3 are negative side effects of this suggestion.

I think we should just make the contact detail page more prevalent to users. I mean, honestly, in order to even link your ID, you have to click User Menu > Contact Details. Not every member knows that page exists, which is the root of the problem, not that they don't want to.

There's so many options to click, it's a bit ridiculous, frankly. If I was a new member (or even someone who uses the site occasionally), I wouldn't know where to begin with setting my Discord ID if I had one. Contact Details should be better promoted, rather than being hidden in layers and layers of user management settings.

 

[Turtle]

maybe a popout oauth window ? then people dont have to do follow a tutorial, only click a few buttons that they have already clicked a million times for shit like bots

 

[pisco]

What about those who don’t have Discord?