I can definitely understand the point about users looking like just a line of data, especially for newcomers. On reddit if someone says "oh, I've seen this guy posting here before", I think: how do you even notice them as an individual? I think most of the time I don't even look at usernames on reddit. Here, I could see the same thing happening. I've been on the site long enough that the veil of impersonality for all the frequent users has melted away and I can actually pin an individual with opinions, thoughts, and feelings on their pen name. If I were new I would have no way to do that. I know some subreddits utilize a line of flair (which may be entirely customizable) which I think helps a lot to put a person to the name. Another idea to throw in the pot. I think the key to new identifiers is that they should be tasteful and have some form of uniformity within the site's aesthetic, lest we look like a geocities page. So if we use avatars, it should be something within certain confines (like the little circle G+ uses, eg.).
I never look/ed at screen names on reddit. When I came to Hubski I had to learn that it was important here. I think I lurked a lot so it wasn't a blatant issue that I publicly overcome, but I remember realizing that users had histories here. I think users having avatars and personalization would actually help the old guard too. When a big wave of users comes in it is easy for me to confuse new users because there are so many and I have no history with any of them. This happened with the recent wave. If I can recognize you beyond your name (and some users, not that I begrudge you, have names that are more confusing than specifically memorable) it will help me remember that maybe we've actually had a positive interaction, and that dickbag I'm thinking of is someone else.
I've never had that problem myself, but now that I think about, I can see how it'd be an issue for people who are used to an environment as large as Reddit. What does help in Hubski's favor is that this place is so small you easily run into the frequent posters day in and day out, making learning who is who an easy thing. It's the infrequent posters that pose a bit of an identifying dilemma.
Someone suggested to mk, and I think he is looking into it, the idea of having the ability to privately tag users. I kind of like this idea, as it's not something I've seen done yet.I've been on the site long enough that the veil of impersonality for all the frequent users has melted away and I can actually pin an individual with opinions, thoughts, and feelings on their pen name. If I were new I would have no way to do that.
I know some subreddits utilize a line of flair (which may be entirely customizable) which I think helps a lot to put a person to the name. Another idea to throw in the pot.
Private tags have their uses, but "identity" is not one of them. I don't know if you can add friends on Reddit anymore. You used to be able to. I'd "friend" everybody who ever said, publicly or privately, that they'd "friended" me - which accomplishes nothing other than turning names red. At one point there were over 300 people on my "friends" list. Most of them have deleted their accounts. I probably see a "friend" twice a year. But back in the day, it sure helped knowing that I was talking to someone who actually gave a shit about me... ...and this is the functionality we get simply from green vs. gray names.
It's a private tag. It could be used in so many ways, including as an identifier of sort. Personally, I'd use it to sumarize people. For example, if I was another user tagging my profile, it might say "nerd,cars,martialarts." That right there would be enough to jog my memory on people. I'm actually waiting to see if mk will implement this idea or not. If not, I'm seriously thinking about keeping a notebook next to my computer to better keep track of people I don't interact with as often on here.Private tags have their uses, but "identity" is not one of them.