[…] if you’re going to be promoting transparency having your account set as private is not a strong endorsement
I set privacy options to (near) max on any site I register by default. I have no clue what this entails in regards to sales on this site (and it sure isn’t mentioned there). Is there a help page/thread I could consult?
But either setting sure has no implication on the visibility of my posts in this forum or in classifieds – or not?
That would neither be my intention nor would I’ve expected that, when setting "View your details on your profile page" to "people you follow". So I’ve checked in a private browser window (without being logged in, of course):Nobody can view your profile, or see your list of previous posts, started threads, media, or gallery items, among other non-invasive actions.
The list of my previous posts is there for anybody to see. You don’t even need an account. Just hover over my username and click on the number below "Messages" => posts. The list of threads isn’t private either. Both can be found with (advanced) search, too. Same goes for other content (pkrchp has not added any albums yet.) and feedback (no official deals so far).
So just for kicks I searched for "private feedback" to find someone else with a private profile. Thanks to How to leave feedback for members who have their account on private I checked the aforementioned pages (with different userID) for @ReallyGoodUsername , too. It worked flawlessly. So I actually don’t get what the fuss is all about.
To me it seems privacy set to anything else than "All visitors" or "members only" just hides the profile page for these groups and therefore direct links (from there) to content that’s available nonetheless. So it might be a bit more complicated to get there, but it’s possible anyway.
If I’m right and if that’s really the case it should definitely be altered – both ways: All that should be private for real shouldn’t be accessible and all that’s in plain sight should be available from a user’s profile page no matter the user’s privacy settings. Anything else is just window dressing. And if it’s not possible due to XenForo limitations I’d expect an information on the privacy settings page saying that it actually doesn’t do a lot.
Maybe @Tommy can chime in.
PS: I’ll change my settings in 2 days. Just in case somebody needs a test case till then.