Here on Stack Overflow, you’re a ‘user.’ On 43things.com you’re a ‘person.’ On other sites, you’re an ‘account.’ And then some web apps skip the usage of this kind of signifier, and it’s just http://webapp.com/yourusername
Do you think that these signifiers imply anything at all? Do you prefer one over the other?
In building an application, I often come to this step in the process and stumble on whether to call users of the application a ‘user’ or a ‘person’ or an ‘account.’ I’m sure there are other examples, but these are the ones I come across most often. I’m curious what others think when coming to building the user management functions of their applications. I think most default to using ‘user,’ but do you put any thought into why?
This semantic is contextual. In a community site, you are often a ‘member’, on a paid service you have an ‘account’. ‘User’ is the generic default. You should choose a moniker that best describes what is the role of the ‘user’ in your application.