Username Formatting Fad

On August 12, 2007, MikeL posted a topic titled "I sincerely hope," in which he hinted at something that had changed. Users quickly found that he had used CSS to modify his post table in such a way as to allow a small image to be placed to the left of his username, which also had a changed font and removed underline. Shortly, other members began asking for or even using the code themselves. While it was low key at first, some problems arose when Soup forgot a closing style tag, causing his signature to be uneditable, and which also had various effect on the post tables in topics he posted in. Fortunately, this was quickly sorted out.

Controversy arose, however, as users found ways to "change" their username (in reality, just replacing the text). This would allow impersonation of other members, and as a result may result in the ban of the code's usage. It also brought up arguments about the common procedure of HTML fads: one user starts it, others want it, some screw it up, others exploit it, and everyone else complains.

Eventually, it was formally banned by Retriever II.

As an alternative to this, a suggestion was made to allow users to have their own CSS section to allow them to modify their post tables, which RII would be in favor of implementing should there be enough demand.