Does this discourse forum allow users to delete their own forum accounts, and all the posts, etc. with it?
My previous experience with Discourse forums showed me that it is not possible for users with posts more than some certain amount cannot delete their own accounts. Is it the case with this forum as well?
It would make sense, since grin is privacy-focused, that this would be permitted if possible.
It seems like you’ve created enough posts in your forum account.
Can you please go to Your Profile > Preferences > Account , and scroll all the way down and check if you have red “Delete My Account” button or not?
I am a new user, and currently I can see that delete account button. But what I know is this: as you post more and more, that account deletion button disappears.
To me, this is an undesirable behavior of Discourse forums.
Edit: As I reached trust level 1, that account deletion button has disappeared.
It is an undesirable behavior of Discourse forums that that deletion button exists at all. Thanks for the warning.
Why should I put any effort into a reply to a user if the user could take it all down?
Why should I put any effort into a reply to a user if the user could take it all down?
That is certainly another way of looking at it.
However, I also see it as a constraint on user privacy. Sometime in the future I might just want to delete my posts, and vanish – for whatever the reason.
Well, that is my point. You don’t just delete your posts. You delete all replies to topics you started too. At least, that is my experience with all forums I have known. Is Discourse different in this regard?
I have no answer to that.
Anyways… I was just considering this fact from a privacy point of view. You know, you might accidentally dox yourself overtime, as your post history accumulates.
Therefore, I would say, a user has to have an idea about the level of revealing he/she is going to manifest, while using this forum. And the fact that you cannot delete all your post history at once, at one click, but rather you have to delete your posts one by one, which takes time, might prove to be at the disadvantage of some users.
But, on the other hand, I also see the value in preserving the posts in a forum. Because posts enrich the discussion going on in a forum. That’s what forums are for.
Discourse only allows you to delete your account if you have 1 post or less. I run a discourse forum.
Otherwise you have to get an admin to manually “Anonymize User”
It might also give people a false sense of security. E.g. “It’s fine. I can purge my account whenever I wish in the future.”, when in reality you can never be sure that the data is deleted. (In fact, you can probably be sure that it is never deleted.)