As designed Does 'show year of birth' work as intended?

Waddy

Active member
In the privacy settings, if I untick 'show day and month of birth' and leave 'show year of birth' ticked I would expect my profile to display my year of birth or age, but it doesn't, all the other combinations work as expected. I don't know whether this is a bug or a feature.
 
I've always considered showing the year to be dependent on showing the month/day, as over time you effectively reveal your DOB via your age.
 
I've always considered showing the year to be dependent on showing the month/day, as over time you effectively reveal your DOB via your age.

only if people stalk you ;)

The same could be said that if you only reveal your birthday people could eventually work out how old you are, obviously you'd have to be a long term stalker. :eek:

I guess it's a preference thing, some people don't want to reveal their age, but are happy for everybody to know when their birthday is, whereas others are happy to show how old they are, but would rather keep their birthday private. Some don't want people to know either and others want to put it out there for the whole world to see.

I think it would be better to either display the year/age when only 'show year of birth' is selected or grey out the 'show year of birth' option unles 'show day and month of birth' is selected as it doesn't actually do anything on its own. Personally I would go for the former, but at least the latter would clear up any confusion.
 
I believe there's a bug related to this too.

If you uncheck "Show year of birth" then the age disappears from the profile page.
It still appears on the member card though.

Is it worth creating a new thread in the bugs forum for that?

Edit: Well that's very odd, it's no longer doing it. It definitely was 10 minutes ago :confused:
 
I've always considered showing the year to be dependent on showing the month/day, as over time you effectively reveal your DOB via your age.

While this is not terribly important to me, you may want to be aware that some businesses use birth date when accessing personal information. Specifically medical insurance companies, hospitals, and many other institutions.

In the USA when calling them usually all that is required is a social security number, and exact birth date. With that information full access to all information can be obtained, and personal details changed.

Occasionally people like to show their age, but not exact birth date.
 
Show year of birth - I'd expect my age to be shown (although it's hard to decipher age from years).
Show month/day - I'd expect to see my birthday without the year :cool:
 
Show year of birth - I'd expect my age to be shown (although it's hard to decipher age from years).
Show month/day - I'd expect to see my birthday without the year :cool:
Agreed.


I've always considered showing the year to be dependent on showing the month/day, as over time you effectively reveal your DOB via your age.
I was actually interested in showing just my age or year of birth, but not my full DOB. Kind of disappointed that I wasn't able to do that, I was even about to report it as a bug, but found this thread. Like said above, they most likely won't know my date and month of birth unless they stalk me, that is, visit my profile everyday. If they happen to do so then I can live with that.

Currently it seems a bit misleading since if a label says "Show year of birth" you'd think it would, well, show your year of birth. Underneath that particular checkbox it even says, "This will allow people to see your age." So there are two signs indicating that your age will show, but it doesn't...

Assuming someone's birthday is Dec. 28, 1991, I would expect these results:
"Show day and month of birth" checked - December 28
"Show year of birth" - 1991 (and/or Age: 20)
Both options checked: Dec. 28, 1991 (Age: 20)
Both options unchecked: Nothing Shown

If it is insisted that it continue to work the way it is, then doesn't it make more sense for the show year of birth checkbox to automatically select the first checkbox as well, or either having that option disabled by default and only enabled when the first checkbox is checked, since selecting the checkbox by itself doesn't do anything.
 
If it is insisted that it continue to work the way it is, then doesn't it make more sense for the show year of birth checkbox to automatically select the first checkbox as well, or either having that option disabled by default and only enabled when the first checkbox is checked, since selecting the checkbox by itself doesn't do anything.

Totally agree. I've had many questions about this on my site. People expect that checking "Show year of birth" would only show their age, but it just does nothing. Please change this behavior.
 
Totally agree. I've had many questions about this on my site. People expect that checking "Show year of birth" would only show their age, but it just does nothing. Please change this behavior.

I have been getting the same questions on my site. I have a bunch of users that dont want their birthday public, but to still show their age and are aware a stalker could of course figure it out but those are few and far between.
 
This is a closed bug report, you'd probably be best to create a new suggestion thread (if there isn't one already).
 
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