> If the username becomes a form of self-expression on your service, users will want to change it from time to time.
IMO separating identity from display-name is an under-used design choice, especially if you think your system needs to scale up to lots and lots of unique accounts.
I think Steam is an easy example of a service which does it right: Many people (usually in different social circles) can use the same name, you can change your display name easily, other people can see some previously-used names, and you can assign custom names to friends to avoid confusion.
> Pre-supplied questions make the guessing problem worse.
Personally I've love to have the option of choosing my own question.
All too often the pre-supplied questions suck in various ways. Some might be patently insecure (ex: name of highschool), inapplicable (name of first pet) or just too ambiguous to rely on (name of street you grew up on, if you moved a lot.)
With a custom question, I could craft something both secure (at least against non-family) and also unambiguous to future-me. Ex: "Your worst encounter with bees occurred in what place?"
IMO separating identity from display-name is an under-used design choice, especially if you think your system needs to scale up to lots and lots of unique accounts.
I think Steam is an easy example of a service which does it right: Many people (usually in different social circles) can use the same name, you can change your display name easily, other people can see some previously-used names, and you can assign custom names to friends to avoid confusion.
> Pre-supplied questions make the guessing problem worse.
Personally I've love to have the option of choosing my own question.
All too often the pre-supplied questions suck in various ways. Some might be patently insecure (ex: name of highschool), inapplicable (name of first pet) or just too ambiguous to rely on (name of street you grew up on, if you moved a lot.)
With a custom question, I could craft something both secure (at least against non-family) and also unambiguous to future-me. Ex: "Your worst encounter with bees occurred in what place?"