Journal #8192 by Striker

Striker

Posted 10 years ago2013-06-23 21:56:14 UTC

StrikerI forgot to check the oil pressure

Ok this is weird. I'm not registered on wikipedia as an editor, I never edited an article, and even if I will, I will do so constructively.
Yet today I see that I've got "a message" on a wiki page. At first I thought some kind of malware got in my PC, but I still clicked it.

Seems like for the IP I currently have (I have a dynamic IP) "I" received several warnings( on articles I never even visited), with a final warning after which I will be blocked from editing.

I'm not really concerned, because tomorrow I'll probably have a new IP, but this raises some questions:
How do PCs on internet are actually identified?
If some guy gets banned on a site and then I receive his IP, what happens?
Or is Wikipedia just broken?

[EDIT] I'm thinking of pasting a link to an interesting website I discover in each journal, or in some at least.

Link #1: Very interesting spore-like game in which you compose music by creating tiny waveform creatures which interact.

Soup Miner

Commented 10 years ago2013-06-24 00:20:35 UTC Comment #58299

That's what your MAC address is. It's a hardwired identifier for devices connected to a network.

DiscoStu

Commented 10 years ago2013-06-24 03:12:55 UTC Comment #58302

You should completely disregard that. You said the answer yourself: You have a dynamic IP. Someone that had your IP before messed up on Wikipedia and got Wikipedians angry. A few days after, that IP was reassigned to you, and you're seeing things meant for someone else. Since that person didn't register as a user, only their IP got registered. Just the same, soon that IP will be assigned to yet another person and you'll have a new IP that won't be blocked.

The only way to tell computers apart on the internet with no additional communication is through their IP address. This is, of course, pretty unreliable over a period of time because of dynamic IPs. Things like this happen.

It's no big deal, really. Just ignore it. It has happened to me too.